The Madman and the Catalyst
by Hydroxide
Summary: Commander Shepard faces an impossible trio of choices to end the Reaper menace. But before he can choose, the Crucible is gatecrashed by a blue police box. And thus starts an improbable adventure, as the commander and a lunatic attempt to change the future of the galaxy with a police box, a screwdriver, and a bit of help. Rated T.
1. Ch 1: The Fourth Option

_Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate._

Shepard limped slowly. To his right, the glowing ethereal figure of a child watched him dispassionately. Before him lay the core of the Citadel, and the choice that stared at him mercilessly. Never before had he felt so weak. And never had he been this powerful.

He pondered the weight of the Carnifex pistol in his hand. It held one last clip. He could empty it into the glowing child in a last futile response of rage. Even better, he could put it to his head and ride a bullet into oblivion. No more choices to make. No one else to die because of him.

But the weight of endless, countless lives pressed upon him. Ghosts and memories from distant stars formed a solemn procession in his mind, each one reminding him of the impossible decision in his hands. Commander Shepard, champion and scourge of the galaxy. The hero and the demon. The savior of worlds and the destroyer of stars.

_Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate._

_Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure._

A rumble tore through the floor, sending Shepard momentarily off-balance. Another ship had met its end. An hour ago, in a distant life, he would have checked if it was a Reaper dreadnought; celebrated inwardly if it was, mourned briefly if it wasn't. That was then. He no longer cared.

The walkway branched off in front of him. The branch to the right led to the core of the Catalyst itself. Two inches of reinforced glass protected the core intelligence of countless fleets of the oldest and most destructive threat to the galaxy. Two or three Carnifex rounds would obliterate the sensitive synthetics. Extinguish the Reapers for good.

And he would die. Synthetics were part of the systems that kept him alive. The Geth, the robotic platforms who at last gained individualities and personalities, would join him. Millions of lights extinguished. And EDI, the artificial intelligence that had guided his ship through countless light-years, would never know what it would be like to be truly human.

The path to the left led to the Catalyst's control conduit—the focus of the Illusive Man's dream and obsession. Total control over the Reapers. Domination and power. He could release Earth, Palaven, and Thessia from their presence within minutes. He could rebuild the galaxy with them. A new era, a new beginning.

Harbinger's words rang in his ear: _Assuming direct control. _How ironic it would be to turn the tables. The Reapers, finally subjugated. The race dedicated to consuming the galaxy would itself be consumed by him.

And he would never leave. He would know neither death nor life. Imprisoned in the Citadel, he would stay, watching the stars swirl and circle around him for eternities to come.

Then there was the pulsating, blindingly bright beam running central to the Citadel's core. He need only throw himself into it. The Crucible's brilliant machinations would dissipate his consciousness and essence across the stars. Life itself would be rewritten as synthetics and organics merge into a collective. EDI and Joker would at last be together in every sense of the word. Devoid of a reason to pursue annihilation of all organic sentient lifeforms, the Reapers would instead join the ranks of the galaxy's denizens. A perfect ending, or so it seemed; at his expense. The choice would never be easy. Things stopped being easy an eternity ago.

He stared at the beam, pondering the vast energy that traveled down its path. Soaking in the idea of disappearing into nothingness. Fragmenting into an oblivion that transcended death.

Was it just him, or was the beam getting brighter?

Suddenly multiple ghostly holograms of the small child appeared around the core, each one flickering in and out of phase like corrupted recordings. Gone was the child's emotionless, soft voice. Instead, a metallic voice assailed his ears—

_Primary level twelve temporal anomaly detected—timeline parse records compromised—extensive continuum rupture—initiating lockdown protocols—_

And immediately the entire expanse of the Citadel lit up with a flash of the brightest blue.

* * *

Shepard hauled himself back on his feet, only to collapse to his knees again. His body was most definitely broken. And likely, so was his mind. Because right in front of him, five feet down the walkway, was a blue police box off the streets of London.

The door of the police box swung open.

And out stepped a man, wearing a clean chestnut-brown trench coat, a black bowtie, and a broad smile.

'Well hello there!'

* * *

**Hello, everyone, it's my first time here and it's good to be a part of this community. This is my first fanfiction on this site. I enjoyed Mass Effect 3 but felt that the ending was anticlimatic to say the least. I thought about writing something about the ending. And I thought, add some Dr Who, because why not? Please rate and comment, I hope to improve and write more for your enjoyment.**


	2. Ch 2: Final Beacon of the Inusannon

**Thalavr, final Inusannon colony**

_**Four hundred and fifty Reaper cycles in the past**_

'Kalvr! Seal the doors!'

The lithe warrior broke from cover and dashed towards the mouth of the massive crypt. It was now or nevermore. He stood at the lip of the stone monolith, gazing out at a massive battlefield spanning the valley, divided into two distinct colours. Green represented the bulk of the Inusannon people, grouped together for one gruesome last stand. The wave of green splintered and fractured, retreating further and further back from the battlefield. And blue kept coming. Blackened, atrophied masses, glowing bright blue between ruptured pores and body orifices. And at the line where the two colours met, Kalvr saw ranks upon ranks of green slowly turning into blue.

He closed his eyes and gave the biometric command to shut the crypt and seal the fate of his brethren fighting outside.

A massive stone wall slammed down like the hand of a god. The only light leaked in from the cracks in the ceiling, slowly releasing the final quanta of energy from a dying sun to a dying world. He ran further into the cave.

A lone figure stood inside the heart of the crypt, gazing down at a pulsating ball of green light suspended above a pedestal.

'Make peace with the deities, Kalvr. We will join them soon. All of us. We leave this world as we came in. Together as one.'

Kalvr dropped his sidearm—he needed it no longer. He made the sign of the Glyph. 'Are you afraid, Telenos?'

Telenos smiled. 'Yes. I am. But that gives great meaning to what we shall soon do.'

He gestured towards the glowing sphere with his ancillary appendage. 'All our calculations, all our work, all our research bought with countless lives—they point to the far distant future—to one point in space and time. Where anything is possible. Where the space-time continuum breaks all the rules and the laws of possibility and probability are suspended, if only for a moment. A point tied to the fate of the Reapers and that of the galaxy.'

Telenos pointed upwards. 'We will use our beacon to send our message outwards, through the fabric of the universe, forward in time, drawing on every single power cell on our planet. We will collapse our entire power grid and end the last chapter of our glorious civilization. For this one slim chance.'

He paused for a moment. 'That sometime in the future, after cycles and cycles innumerable, in this one point in time and space, the rules of the universe would go blank. And then, anything could happen. Anyone could attempt the impossible—and _succeed. _And at that one moment, in that one impossible moment in time, _he might hear us_.'

Telenos mentally prepared himself. Self-sacrifice was a part of the Inusannon consciousness. Mothers sacrificed the use of their lower appendages, crippling them for life, in order to give birth to a new child. Every warrior carried a biological bomb embedded within the abdominal cavity, to be detonated when the ultimate sacrifice was needed. And on this day, Telenos knew that they would all die for the sake of life forms yet unformed, for races yet unseen—for the slim chance that their message will be heard. That one solar cycle will dawn when the Reapers were no more.

The noise of battle came closer. The time was nigh. Kalvr's triple heart was calm. He spoke without fear, in a quiet voice of childlike wonder. 'I have…imagined. I once wondered if he could have come to save us this day. If only this Reaper cycle was not closed to the possibility of our survival. If only the death of our entire race was not a fixed point in time. If only the Inusannon need not die.' He was silent for a moment. 'Tell me again about him, priest.'

Telenos activated the beacon. As the globe powered up, and the endless years of civilization collapsed, he gazed upwards. 'He walks the stars. He has seen the birth and death of races before us, and will see the ascension of countless more. And where he visits—_when_ he visits, there is hope. His name has become part of our language. The word means _He Who Walks the Fields of Time_.

We call him—'

* * *

'—the Doctor. Of course. Nice to meet you. Where are my manners? I'm sorry. Did I ever tell you about the microbes that cause people to become increasingly more rude? Annoying, I tell you. Spent half a day putting a stop to the riot that broke out in Falkirk because of those little bugs. Didn't help that William Wallace rolled up his sleeves and joined in with all Scottish gusto.' The man in the suit was still speaking, bouncing and pacing in front of the blue police box like a child on a sugar rush.

Shepard's Carnifex was a few feet away. If he were to muster his energy, he could make a lunge for the gun. He drew upon the last reserves of his strength and tightened the muscles of his body.

Then the strange man simply walked over and scooped up the gun.

Shepard's slim hope evaporated. His resolve emptied, he laid his head back on the floor with a thud, and watched the man retrieve what looked like a pen from his pocket. It glowed green and buzzed cheerfully as he waved it over the gun, turning it over with his spindly fingers. Almost immediately, the man swept the pen up to eye level like a hopeful woman checking a pregnancy testing kit.

'Ahh, I see. Intriguing! Mass and energy-continuum manipulators, accelerator systems, the whole shebang.' He paused. 'Never said so many long twisty words in a long time. Brilliant! The most advanced bit of technology I've seen for the past week was a stick used to make a _slice of cheesecake_. Don't ask me how. Right! Hm, unless I'm very much mistaken, your little sidearm here places the time period of our little adventure in—the heyday of interstellar travel, the advent of mass relay transportation! Wonderful! Right, here you go!' He chirpily tossed the pistol towards Shepard before spinning around on his heel to face the bright beam.

The commander caught the pistol with both hands, instinctively latched his index finger around the trigger, and thrust the muzzle towards the lunatic prancing in front of him.

'I've had—just enough—of all this.' Shepard took aim. He pulled the trigger.

_Click._

'I would also mention that I've just disabled the thermal clip.' The stranger spoke calmly without turning around. His voice had dropped half an octave.

Shepard prepared to power up his omnitool. If he could calibrate the blade just right…

'I've also disabled the quantum manipulation weapons systems on your gauntlet while I was talking to you. Impressive, eh?' The stranger turned towards Shepard, smirking weakly.

'You—what do you want? Tell me what the hell you are.' Shepard pushed himself up with his elbows, raising his upper torso slightly off the ground. He had run out of moves. This deranged interloper in a tweed suit had just unraveled everything he had fought so hard to accomplish on the Crucible.

The strange man was no longer smiling. 'That question belongs to _me_.' His lips were pulled thin and his eyebrows narrowed. 'You just pulled a weapon and attempted to fire on an unarmed man without provocation. Your armour and advanced firearms seem to indicate a military rank of the highest order.'

The humor in his voice had evaporated and was replaced with the deepest disgust. 'In which case, you, sir, are an _absolute disgrace_ to your uniform.'

He strode menacingly towards Shepard. Shepard could not avoid recoiling.

Without taking his eyes off Shepard, the man in the suit gestured towards the blue police box. 'I was pointed here by a signal, a set of coordinates that was specified down to the accuracy of _two feet _and _fifty seconds_. It overrode the TARDIS' directional control and dragged me right here. Someone or something wanted me to be here very badly. Which means that you, soldier boy,' he pointed at Shepard, 'better start telling me what you are doing so close to my landing spot.'

Shepard felt nothing inside. Not anger, not despair, not even pain. There was nothing left to feel.

'My name is Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy. With every word I speak, a thousand perish under the Reaper forces on Earth. This machine here, this…_Crucible_…was the final hope for all of us. It _was_. You have just destroyed our last hope. We've failed.'

Shepard relaxed his elbows and he slumped to the cold floor. 'If you're not here to help, Earth's fate is sealed. Please, whatever you are, do me a favor and finish me off. I'm done being the sole survivor.'

He lifted his head and found the man's face inches from his own. The man was squatting down, staring at Shepard with intense fervor. There was no trace of the frenetic, bouncy adventurer that sauntered out of the police box barely two minutes ago.

'Tell me about Earth. Tell me what threatens humanity in this time.' The stranger's voice was barely a whisper. 'Tell me now.'

Shepard summoned what was left of his will. He was a dying man, hovering above a dying world. He might as well deliver humanity's eulogy, even if it was to a lunatic.

'The Reapers came from deep space. They are a race of sentient synthetic creatures that ate and assimilated all in their way. They've wiped out countless worlds and entire star clusters on their path to our corner of the galaxy. Earth is next. We'll join the parade of death. With the bulk of our fleets now destroyed, the Reapers will be unstoppable.' The commander stared out of the massive windows into space, beholding the massive Reaper dreadnoughts as they drifted past. 'This Crucible was our only hope. Something to stop the Reapers. The Catalyst very nearly gave me the solution. And then…' Shepard breathed deeply, and uttered his next word with venom. '_You._'

His eyes met that of the strange man. Neither blinked. Then the eccentric man jumped to his feet. 'Well, I suppose it would do us good to find out about this _Crucible_ of ours, wouldn't it?' The glowing pen in his hand buzzed energetically as he pointed it around the room and waved it at the countless wires and conduits that paved the central core. 'Interesting. Ah!' He raised the pen to his eye. 'So what we've got here…looks like an extremely complex artificial intelligence—which itself occupies a massive structure of incredible complexity. A machine capable of building other machines…would I be correct in saying that your _Reapers_—' he gestured out to the menacing synthetic leviathans outside the viewing port '—were created from this Crucible?'

Shepard sighed wearily. 'He told me as much.' His body was going numb. He was having millisecond-long blackouts with every breath.

The man spun to face Shepard. '_He _told you? What do you mean, _he _told you? How can this massive thing have a _gender_?'

The omnitool on Shepard's arm flashed seemingly in response to the stranger's question. A holographic image of the young boy, clad in a white sweater, appeared in mid-air. Shepard saw a flash of brown before his eyes as the man moved at lightning speed. When he blinked again, the man was on all fours, his nose almost touching the hologram.

'Intriguing! A projection of an artificial consciousness! How brilliant! But…hang on. Why a _jacket_, of all things? Why this white jacket? It's so tacky…' The man muttered. And that was it. Shepard had too little strength to fight, but he had just enough energy to explode.

'Idiot! You stupid deranged idiot!' His arm tensed, and with a sudden burst of rage he tossed his pistol at the man's face. The stranger ducked just in time. 'That thing could wear a tutu for all I care! I don't need some wacko getting in my way, while my planet gets ravaged!' His last sentence came out in a shuddering gasp. No, he can't black out. Not now.

'_Ravaged_, you say?' The man said gravely as he got to his feet, picking up Shepard's discarded pistol. 'No, I don't believe anything is getting _ravaged_ just yet. In fact, if you've noticed, they have not been _ravaging_ anything for the past five minutes.' He went silent.

Shepard pressed his hand against his forehead, trying to still the pounding behind his temple…and listened carefully too. The massive reverberations that announced the destruction of more Alliance vessels—were gone. The Crucible was still as a grave. Outside, the Reaper ships were still. No energy beams fired, no ancillary craft detached from their undersides. They weren't even moving.

'Which means,' the man spoke softly, 'that they're about to figure out that their new number one priority targets are now standing _right here_.'

Shepard blinked twice. His vision was failing him. He reached for his omnitool controls. 'Need to tell…the fleet! Our chance…strike back…'

'You won't be doing anything for quite a long while, old chap.' The man adjusted his bowtie and walked slowly towards Shepard, his gait smooth and unhurried.

Shepard raised his hand to give the man a good punch. Or at least he tried. The signals to raise his hand left his brain and went nowhere. His hand did nothing except to give a little twitch. 'Why…not...?'

'Because,' the man explained, 'you just wasted the last bit of your strength to throw a gun at my face.'

Shepard's eyelids dropped and his world went dark.

* * *

'Get to the extraction point! All of you! Leave the dead!' Admiral Hackett's voice came over the command channel.

'Let's go! He's done what he came here to do!' Garrus took Tali's arm and propped it over his own shoulder.

'No…Shepard…we need to get to Shepard…' Tali moaned softly. Her entire body was limp, and her suit was leaking in several places. Part of her fired frantic reminders into her brain that fatal infection would soon set in.

The other part of her wanted it to happen quickly. Wanted to die with Shepard.

Garrus hauled the frail body of the Quarian towards the waiting Mako. He struggled with the dead weight. Every time Tali's body weight hit his shoulder blades, they lit up with pain. His right shoulder was almost certainly demolished. As they neared the shuttle, he handed Tali over to the waiting N7 soldier. 'Get her out of here! I'm covering the extraction!'

'Garrus—' Tali whispered.

'Leave, Tali! Shepard would have wanted you safe!' Garrus yelled over the ubiquitous background sounds of gunfire. He pushed her unceremoniously into the back of the shuttle.

'Garrus, the Reapers!' She cried breathlessly.

Garrus turned around to face the horizon.

Harbinger, the massive Reaper dreadnought that had all but brutalized their entire division, was lifting off from the ground. Its laser wasn't charged. It wasn't even paying attention to the futile gunfire from the troops under its enormous mass. It simply soared straight up, as gentle as a balloon, drifting over the demolished city.

All around London, the black squid-like shapes of the Reapers began to lift off into the sky. The remaining Reaper ground forces—reanimated bodies, massive augmented abominations—simply ceased to fight and stared upwards blankly at the departing Reaper vessels. The sober-minded soldiers quickly put them down, ever wary of any threat. The other soldiers, tired of combat, simply joined them in staring at the sky, perplexed. The entire visible sky was now covered with Reaper ships, all moving away from London. One Reaper casually tore through London Bridge like a child collapsing a stack of toy blocks, as it soared up to join its brethren.

The Reapers were leaving.

A few soldiers tried to raise a cheer. No one else joined in.

Admiral Hackett came over the intercom again. He sounded confused but wary. 'I…I don't know what happened. The Reapers are leaving in droves. And—hang on, similar reports are coming in from Belfast, Paris, Berlin, Moscow. This is happening worldwide.'

Hackett paused before issuing a new command. 'All units regroup and fall back! We've fought the Reapers for too long to get careless now. Prepare for anything. Stack up near any nearby vantage points. Set up a perimeter and make space for a basic field hospital. Whatever the cause of it, use this lull to regroup and rearm.'

Garrus clicked the communicator button in his visor. 'Admiral! Any word from Shepard or Anderson?'

'No news from them yet. Last sighting was them headed for the beam. Presumably they've reached the Citadel. The Crucible is in position.'

Garrus gazed at the bright beam at the distance, running from the ground upwards into the sky.

'And…Garrus?' Hackett's voice came in again. It was shaking now. 'Our orbital sensors indicate the entire Reaper fleet massing and moving towards the Crucible in full force. Reapers close to the Crucible have begun landing on the surface of the Citadel. Estimated contact time of the whole fleet is in twenty minutes.' Hackett paused for a beat. 'I'm…sorry. I truly am.'

Garrus stared blankly into the distance. From the interior of the shuttle, a gasping sob whispered softly, followed by a sorrowful plea that broke the hearts of everyone in earshot.

'Shepard…'

* * *

**Feedback is welcome and much appreciated! Hope you like where this is going. **


	3. Ch 3: Requiem for a World

_Shepard was at dinner and the waiter was bringing him the third course of the meal. The smiling attendant uncovered the dish to reveal a steaming pink cuttlefish sitting atop a blob of spaghetti sauce. The waiter smiled and wished Shepard a '_bon appetit_,' but as he opened his mouth his jaw split open and his vest cracked and oozed blue fluid. And now the cuttlefish was no longer a little squid on his dinner plate but hundreds of stories tall, and the spaghetti sauce wasn't sauce at all but people, wading and screaming amidst the blood and viscera of their fellow human beings. And then the cuttlefish turned its red eye to Shepard and charged its laser._

Shepard awoke with a gasp. It was immediately followed by a groan of pain as his damaged muscles screamed in protest at the cumulative abuse inflicted on them over the past week of nonstop combat. He opened his eyes and immediately felt the sting of a viscous film of dried tears and sweat. Slowly, his eyes adjusted.

He was staring upwards at an expanse of bright playroom yellow. It took him a few seconds to realize that he was lying on the lower bunk of a double-bunk bed, staring at the bottom of the upper bunk. The last time he checked, the Reapers did not build double-bunk beds into any part of the Citadel.

He took a deep breath, anticipating the pain to follow, and turned his neck slowly to the right. The cervical vertebrae cracked and popped and his head rotated in slow excruciating degrees. He waited for the pain to subside, and looked. He was in a child's room of sorts. A small crib rested forlornly in the corner of the room. The walls were painted bright blue. Aside from the crib, the room was empty. The room had one door, painted to look like the door of a police box.

_I need to get up. _Shepard drew the scattered fibers of his mind together for this task. He slowly swung first his right leg—then his left—over the side of the bed, and lowered them to the floor. The harsh feeling of cold metal bit into the soles of his feet. Then, he pushed slowly and painfully with his arms, raising his torso until he fell forward into a sitting position. He gave himself five minutes to breathe and recover.

_How long was I out? _His mind worked slowly.

Then he remembered the strange man, his bowtie, and what he did. How he destroyed the Catalyst with a police box.

_He's taken me away. _Shepard realised the gravity of the situation. He was spirited away, possibly held prisoner, while the Reapers whittled away at Earth's forces, wreaking havoc on the world he held dear and fought so hard to save. Once again, he was a million miles from home, at the mercy of a shadowy figure he knew nothing about. Somehow, the image of the Illusive Man, cigarette in hand, floated before him unbidden.

He forced himself to his feet, finally getting on top of the pain. He forced down the fatigue, drawing on every fibre of his mental capacity. The cybernetic augmentations in his nervous system were beginning to kick in. His strength increased slowly as the artificial agonists flooded his bloodstream, and with each rise in strength came a burst in purpose.

He made for the door.

_This is the last time a man in a suit gets the better of me._

* * *

On the last count, Garrus figured out that in the past ten minutes, he had just torn his way through 1,543 regulations in Alliance military protocol, with about 545 of them warranting a court martial and 41 of them being grounds for a summary execution. Also on the last estimate, he counted forty five people who couldn't care less.

Security was lax. Most of the infantry divisions were too occupied with forming a perimeter to bother about a few missing troops. With some rough-and-dirty diplomacy—and a bit of muscle from Wrex, the massive krogan commander—Garrus managed to hastily procure a few vehicles from the armored division.

Admiral Hackett had said that the Reapers would be at the Crucible within twenty minutes. That gave their team about ten more minutes to reach the transportation beam that reached down to central London. Ten minutes to give Shepard a fighting chance.

_Or die along with him_, Garrus thought.

Their team tore through London's streets at speeds that dangerously stressed the engines. Garrus perched carefully on the top of the armored personnel carrier, scanning the rooftops for stray marauders or cannibals. Scout aircraft reported a significant presence of Reaper forces clustered around the beam. Despite being deprived of fire support and direct control from the Reaper ships, they still posed a threat with their sheer numbers.

'We've got husks, incoming twelve o' clock!' James yelled from the mounted turret aboard the nearby tank. Garrus looked ahead and immediately felt the thrill of adrenaline. A frenzied, aimless mass of Reaper ground troops spanned the entire area around the beam. And the mass was now charging their small column like a mass of berserk cancer attacking a lymph node.

'Rip them up! Keep up the speed!' Garrus shouted back, drawing his assault rifle.

_Nothing will stop us getting to that beam._

_We're getting to Shepard._

_Whatever the cost._

* * *

Urdnot Wrex was on a rampage. The massive, nine-foot-tall krogan had long since given up using his shotgun and was now getting up close and personal with every Reaper in his way. As a marauder rose up from under a pile of rubble nearby, his right hand shot forwards and closed around the beast's throat in a vise.

'Kill them all! Fight like krogan, be merciless!' He yelled over the carnage. 'I'll eat my way through Harbinger's rear end if that's how I get to Shepard!' With a roar, he lifted the hapless marauder over his head and slammed it down on a nearby steel rebar, impaling the beast with a sickening squelch. He wiped the spill of black fluid and loose cybernetics from his face.

'Grunt! On me!' Wrex pointed to the burnt-out chassis of an Alliance tank, about twenty feet to their right. 'Let's draw their attention and give the _pyjaks_ something to think about!'

The hefty krogan next to him nodded. As Wrex leapt over the heads of a husk and took position in the remains of the gunner's seat on the tank, Grunt kicked the dazed husk aside and clambered onto the top of the derelict tank.

He pulled a heavy pistol from his belt and fired into the air. A single ball of charged plasma soared upwards, spraying a pulse of blinding light over the mass of writhing, berserk Reapers. Almost immediately, a soulless, empty shriek answered collectively from the reanimated abominations, rising to a crescendo like a chorus from hell. And across the battlefield, sporadically, heads began to turn. Shrunken, emaciated heads; heads with multiple eye sockets glowing bright blue; alien heads grafted to mutilated torsos.

The tide of Reapers began to charge the tank.

'Well, we've got their attention _now._' Grunt muttered as he loaded a fresh clip into his shotgun.

* * *

'The krogan are diverting the Reapers from our position!' Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams yelled to her small team. 'Garrus, James, Javik and Liara are making a push for the beam. Let's give them covering fire! Move it!'

As the squad of marines set up a hasty garrison at their position, Ashley spotted the column of three tanks plowing through the mass of the Reaper troops, driving full speed towards the beam. The krogans' little gambit had pulled the bulk of the enemy force away from the path of the tanks. Her job was now to thin out what remained so that at least some of their number made it alive to get to Shepard.

'Weapons free! Covering fire!' Ashley barked the command. The air exploded with the sound of automatic weapon fire. Husks were decapitated, cannibals had arms and legs blown off, and Brutes collapsed with the sheer force of hundreds of bullets. The three tanks kept pushing. The remaining Reapers, those not drawn off by Wrex and Grunt, were no longer attacking the tanks. Instead, dozens of husks and cannibals were simply throwing themselves under the forward tank, adding their bodies to a crushed morass of dead flesh and cybernetics in an effort to slow down the advance of the iron machines.

As the air lit up with the smell of hot plasma, Ashley was suddenly struck by a memory. Shepard and her, standing by the docking bay of the Normandy, as she struggled with the aftermath of the Cerberus attack on the Citadel. How he forgave her for pointing a gun at him, for not trusting him for who he was. How he had welcomed her back aboard the only place she had ever felt at home.

_And, Williams? _He had joked.

_Keep your gun pointed at the Reapers._

She loaded a fresh box of ammunition into her light machine gun.

_I'll do that, Shepard._

Her world went blank. For one second, Ashley thought that she'd gone blind and deaf at the same time.

Then she glanced at the tank column. The front tank had blown its fuel cells. The entire rear of the tank was demolished. The narrow path they had cleaved through the Reaper ranks was now blocked by the dead tank.

There was no way forward.

And the Reapers kept coming.

* * *

The SSV Normandy, pride of the Alliance, flagship of the greatest human commander to ever enter the service of the galaxy, was now on a suicide mission.

The bridge was quiet. The star map flashed and rotated, updating coordinates and displaying information to the technicians, officers, and yeomen that weren't there. The lights were turned off in the war room. The cantina and crew quarters played soft jazz music, a light-hearted saxophone piece by Benny Goodman. Only Jeff 'Joker' Moreau remained at the helm of the mighty ship, tapping his thighs wistfully to the beat of the music.

At his side was the intelligence—and now, woman—that had been at his side and all around him for the only years of his life that counted to him. The Enhanced Defence Intelligence—now simply EDI to all who knew her—stood at his side, one synthetic hand on his shoulder. Fully unshackled, completely self-aware, and now in a humanoid body, she was as much a lover to him as any woman could be to a man. For the Normandy was her body, and Joker knew every curve and cranny, every idiosyncrasy and minor quirk, that belonged to the magnificent ship. Which was why he would not join the evacuation. Why he chose to stay at the cockpit as the officers abandoned all semblance of rank and crammed into the escape shuttles, shoulder to shoulder with cooks and janitors and petty officers, and fled to safety. Joker would rather stay on board. He would rather stay home.

'Final bombs rollout. All hard points empty of ammunition.' Joker called out, more out of habit than anything else. He fired the last, pointless salvo of missiles and cannon towards the Reapers now assembling in orbit below the Crucible.

The barrage hit a Reaper cruiser on the starboard side. The massive creature shrugged it off.

Joker turned to EDI, speaking in the quiet trembling tone he used only once before, when he touched her hand on the park bench in the Presidium Commons, and told her that he loved her.

'EDI, upload yourself to the Earth server. Save yourself. Live, love, find out how to be human. Leave me to do this alone. Please.'

'No, Jeff. I stay with you. We were together. We'll be together, till it ends.' She whispered. Her face was turned towards his, and her synthetic eyes met his brown, tearful ones. Would she have said, _this intelligence wishes to remain aboard this vessel? _Or perhaps, _contact with organics has indicated that self-sacrifice is given prominent admiration? _No, they had come so far, for so long; she had grown so much. _We'll be together, till it ends._ She was truly his, and he absolutely hers.

Joker tapped the holo-screen. With a few quick slashes of his fingers, all power from the Normandy was directed to the engines. The rooms and quarters of the ship blacked out one by one as the mighty vessel prepared for its final, glorious flight. He turned off the navigation and tracking system. He didn't need it. There were too many targets around for him to possibly miss.

_I'm buying you time, Shepard. Use it well. I'll not be able to pull your ass out again anytime soon._

Without realising it, his unoccupied hand had slid firmly into EDI's.

'Thrusters engaged. Engines at full power.'

He looked out at the moving sea of soulless Reapers, on their way to the Crucible. They seemed in no hurry. Perhaps they knew they had already won. Perhaps they didn't manage to calculate the possibility of an idiot doing what he was planning to do.

He picked the closest, ugliest ship of the bunch and fired thrusters.

As the ship picked up speed and the warnings flashed on the screen, Joker caught himself humming 'Ride of the Valkyries.'

* * *

**I'm still not entirely sure how I'll get them all out of this. Maybe I won't.**


	4. Ch 4: Jump

What he saw was a machine built into the centre of the room, pulsing with moving baubles and a central pump-like mechanism incorporated into a glass pillar, moving up and down in slow steady strokes. Around it, a series of catwalks led to a few other doors in the circular room. The colour scheme was completely tasteless, and the setup reminded him of an old science-fiction set piece from the past century. His best guess was that he was in a small base of some sort, a schizophrenic loony's little hideout tucked away in some forlorn corner of space.

Shepard opened the wooden door a little bit wider and edged his body past the doorway. Thankfully, the door swung almost noiselessly on its hinges. He kept his back hunched to minimise his profile. His eyes swept the room, scanning the perimeter with the acumen of a seasoned soldier.

Underneath the walkway, he spotted a figure in a brown coat scuttling about like a crab on a beach in low tide. The man gave no indication of having seen or heard Shepard's surreptitious entrance.

Shepard breathed deeply but quietly, and channeled the flow of energy to the biotic nodes in his nervous system. The feeling of tingling skin and light-headedness was familiar, but never before had it felt so exhausting or taken so much effort to summon. But in his worst shape, Commander Shepard was certainly more than a match for anyone who dared to take him on. Particularly when he had the element of surprise.

He charged the flow of energy to his fists, banking his hopes on a focused pulse that would expend all the charged kinetic energy on the first target. He trusted his aim enough. At his peak performance, such an attack would almost completely break an opponent's shield. In his current state, while the attack would do minimal damage on decent armour, Shepard was sure it would do just fine on brown overcoats and bowties.

His fists glowed bright. He glanced at the glowing nodes along his palm, and renewed his determination.

_I have a galaxy to save. And you, my man, just happen to be in the way._

He took a step to the edge of the walkway, choosing a vantage point, and prepared for an opportunity to strike.

A voice rang out from below the catwalk. 'Um, you really don't want to be doing that, old chap.'

Shepard froze. The biotic attack remained charged. He waited.

'First of all,' the man continued, 'considering your current condition, your, um, _biotic_ attack would likely do little more than make some bright sparkly lights to brighten up the TARDIS.'

'And secondly,' the man was now walking out from under the walkway, gesticulating wildly, fully exposed, 'you've been out cold long enough for me to bake a soufflé, eat it, poke around at the remains, save it for later, eat some more, then toss the rest out. Including the time it took for first samples and subsequent '_blearrgh_'s; that's a _really long time to be out cold_. So unless you plan on entering a full-blown _coma_, I would suggest holding off your fancy attack, powering off, and _letting me talk_.' A cold hard edge had crept into his voice.

Shepard relented. He dissipated his biotic energy, and instantly felt better as the cellular energy went back into repairing his damaged body. He was getting tired of being outwitted and thwarted with each move he sought to make.

'Good, finally he listens to reason.' The man rolled his eyes, smiled right at Shepard, and rubbed his hands before walking quickly to the central machine. 'Now, while you were having your beauty sleep, I've been trying to work out a little conundrum that involves my machine over here. For one, ever since that unwelcome little signal pulled my TARDIS down into this little bitty point in time and space, all points that come _after _this timeline are now inaccessible.'

Shepard put up a hand. 'Wait a second here. I need some answers. First of all, how long was I out?'

The man scratched his chin for a moment. 'That's a meaningless question, and it shows how little you've been paying attention to me. For one, this here is what you would call a _time machine_. Which means that talking about things like _when_ and_ how long_ is quite pointless once you step inside my beautiful blue box. I don't suppose one 'soufflé-baking time thingy-ish' would count as a measure of length of time?'

He was using something like a stage voice, as if engaged in a profound monologue. 'A real pity. Perhaps I should pop by 1960 and lobby for 'one soufflé thingy-ish' to be added to the proposed International System of Units.'

'So what you're saying is that time isn't running while I'm in here? That right now, the Reapers are still over Earth, and everything is just kind of frozen outside?' Shepard asked, gripping the handrail of the catwalk tightly till his knuckles went numb. 'So while we've the _time _and ability to find a new way to destroy the Reapers, you've been having slumber parties and taking baking classes?'

He was seriously considering a fresh biotic attack. Entering a coma would be worth seeing the stupid grin wiped from the face of this imbecile in a bowtie.

'Nope, wait your turn, now _I_ ask the question.' The man answered. 'Now, privacy invasion aside, I've done a bit of scanning on you while you were taking a nap. Your body has been extensively augmented with experimental biotic implants, to the point where the lymphatic, excretory, and pulmonary circulatory systems have been completely taken over by a synthetic unit. That's interesting and slightly freakish.' The stranger paused to point his glowing pen-like tool at Shepard.

'You are Commander Shepard, of the Alliance Navy, circa 2188 CE, first human member of the Galactic Council's Spectre division, and a former member of the fringe humanist group known as Cerberus. You command the ship SSV Normandy, and for the past months you have been gathering a force to defeat the sentient synthetic intelligence known as the Reapers. With the onset of the Reaper invasion you have been granted autonomy to broker alliances and conduct asymmetric warfare as and when needed, with authority directly from someone named Admiral Hackett, which I assume commands the remainder of your galaxy's military force. Now I might have missed quite a bit of detail on your dossier, and you'd probably like to correct me here or add in a line or two there, but overall it's pretty accurate, and frankly I don't quite care.'

The man had taken a few steps towards Shepard, narrowing the distance between them to a few feet. Shepard cursed himself silently. He had been too busy listening to the man's self-absorbed speech to notice that the man had smoothly stepped past the minimum safe range for any biotic attack he could use. With his omnitool disabled, and his fists about as strong as latex pillows, he was otherwise harmless in combat. In effect, the man had effectively disarmed Shepard, removed use of force from the table, and actually drawn him into a conversation. This guy was good. Irritating, but good.

Shepard walked further down the walkway, towards the man, till they were about two steps apart. He might as well play along. As he moved toward the stranger, he realised with some small hint of pleasure that his own six-foot-two stature gave him a slight vertical edge over the other man. 'Impressive. Now, tell me who you are. You at least owe me that.'

'Well, that story would probably involve a great deal of suspension of disbelief. Unless you've got the stomach for sentient killer statues, mind-wiping manipulative aliens, timey-wimey stuff, let's save it for another time.' The stranger remarked nonchalantly while straightening his bowtie.

'However, I should probably give you a name to call. After all, if, well, let's say someone is writing all this down somewhere, it'll be only so long until 'the stranger,' 'the strange man,' and 'the man in the suit' become tired clichés. There are only so many adjectives available to use as a stand-in for a name. I'm pretty sure there's a fourth wall I'm breaking here.' The stranger said, a smile curling up along his lips. 'For all purposes and intents, you may call me **The Doctor**.' He grabbed Shepard's hand and shook it vigorously.

'Now, as I was saying; in simple English,' He gestured to the massive machine. 'We're stuck. We can't go forward in time past the point when I picked you up from the Crucible. Also, we've been restricted to a very, very specific set of coordinates in space-time in the past. So right now, my little time machine has been ripped up and put on a boring train track that can only go in reverse.'

'Your little time machine also wrecked the only hope for our defeating the Reapers, the one that we've been working on for _months._' Shepard's anger was rising. 'Do you think you can do something about that?'

'Well, that's what I'm getting to, and you're just not _listening_!' The Doctor was becoming fidgety and agitated, clenching and unclenching his fists in front of his face. 'The points in the past that we _can _go to seem to all relate to the creation of the Reapers and the Citadel. Yes, that's that big space city, I know.' He was pacing again, making a circuit around the central console of the machine. 'The message that was sent to us seems to be from someone, or something, that wants us to fix or change something or a number of things in the past. A timeline that spans hundreds and hundreds of galactic years. Something to do with how the Reapers were created.'

Something was hanging in the air. A big, massive elephant in the room that this Doctor person was dancing jigs around. Shepard hit it on the spot.

'Can you fix the Crucible?' Shepard asked pointedly. If this was a madman, at least he had a time machine. They could somehow make something up, gather some scrap, do some work.

'No, I'm afraid I can't. When the TARDIS popped up in the Citadel, it triggered a Class-D space-time anomaly event—when two instances of the same object occupy the same space at once. It was either the TARDIS going bananas, or the Crucible. I guess the Crucible got the short straw. Timey-wimey stuff, right there. But don't worry about that. I don't intend to rebuild the Crucible.'

There was a tense moment of silence as Shepard's rage neared its breaking point. _Please, oh please, let a Thanix laser blast through this place and burn this guy up right before it kills me so that I can die after he does with a smile on my face_—

'You _don't_?' Shepard's fists balled up and he made ready to throw a punch.

'No, my good man.' The Doctor replied. 'I intend to _rebuild the Reapers_.'

* * *

She ran past a world of towering ruins and blazing inferno.

Tali'Zorah vas Normandy teetered on a knife edge with death on either side. On the one hand, she had self-administered a cocktail of antibiotics and stimulants potent enough to both heal her wounds rapidly and to likely kill her with overdose. On the other hand, she was running deeper and deeper into the heart of a crawling malignant plague that had sunk its tendrils into every street in London. With every step towards the Citadel's beam, she knew that her death was imminent.

_In that case, I'll die as close to him as I possibly can_, she thought with bitter determination.

She jumped over the fallen pillar of a human building, torn apart by the onslaught of the Reaper plague. Her path took her higher, over rooftops and between office floors, across the ruins of two centuries of human history erased with the blast of a Reaper's laser. She leapt over vast chasms and mountains of debris, keeping an eye out for handholds and makeshift bridges to cross the next building. Gathering momentum, she sprinted off the edge of a precipice and crashed through the remains of a glass window.

_No, Shepard. Not like this. Not when we are both so, so close._

She heard the scream before seeing the faces. Drawing her pistol, she fired upwards, her years of training taking over her reflexes. The first husk dropped down, its face cleanly unzipped by the plasma round. Two more crawled down from an air vent and dropped to the ground, landing on all fours like hellish eldritch creatures.

She kept running. Behind her and beneath her, she felt the scuttling of hundreds of hands and feet scrambling and crawling from the cracks in the dilapidated building. The Reapers were inside the city. Not just in the streets, on the rooftops or out in the open. They had infested the sewers and ventilation systems, crawled into the cracks and hidden channels of buildings and streets and brickwork, like lice borrowing into the subdural layer of a corpse's skull, or microbes seeping in through the pores in the skin of a Quarian without her suit.

_How can there ever be a future here? How can there be a tomorrow for any of us?_

_How can there be a tomorrow without him?_

A low office block lay ahead, just beyond the next window; the rooftop was about twenty feet lower than the level she was on. The chorus of screams and wails drew closer. She could actually see the malignant blue glow of the corrupted husks reflected off the walls in the lightless hallway.

With one hand, she primed a grenade and then gathered energy for a sprint. With the other hand, she fired one burst that blew the window clean out of the frame to smithereens. Dropping the grenade, she leapt into the air and dangled for a moment over eternity.

The air around her exploded just as the husks leapt out of the window in mindless savage pursuit.

Then the biotic thrusters in her suit kicked in. Her body glowed bright orange for a moment.

She hit the ground with a thud. The shock bounced painfully against every joint in her body. The thrusters, however, had mitigated the worst of the impact. She looked back to see a fresh image of destruction: her grenade explosion had caused the cardinal pillars of the office building to shatter from the percussive force. The husks that hadn't plunged down into oblivion had been crushed by the collapse of the office floor.

She fell to her knees as she felt the first throb of pain tear through her skull from the back of her eyes down to her spinal cord. The painkillers were wearing off, and the remaining drugs were causing her nervous system to scream. She pushed herself to her feet. She had no time for pain.

Suddenly, her communicator buzzed to life.

'Tali'Zorah, you idiot!' It was Garrus, and he was angry. 'Did I drag you all the way from Harbinger onto that rescue shuttle for nothing? Shepard wanted you safe!' He cursed forcefully. 'Will you never obey orders?'

'I'm getting to Shepard, whatever you say!' Tali retorted. 'He needs help, our help, more than ever! I can give him technical support with the Crucible, help him put a stop to this madness! The Reapers are amassing outside the Citadel. He's running out of time!' _And if this universe ends, I want to see it through with him._

Garrus cursed again. Then she heard a frustrated sigh over the broadcast channel. It was the same kind of sigh he gave when he lost a game of poker; a sigh of resignation. 'Fine. Give me your position. I'll try to find a way to provide you with support.'

'I'm topside, moving along the buildings. I'm trying to find a way to the beam from this way.'

'Alright Tali.' Garrus replied. 'I'm on a tank column approaching the beam groundside. How many do you have on your team right now?'

'None. I'm alone.' She continued to sprint along the rooftop. She could see the beam, much closer now, only a block away. 'I'm going to try to throw myself off somewhere into the beam.'

There was a pause. 'Tali, you do realise that is the biggest stupid-ass plan I've ever heard.'

'For Shepard, I could go stupider.' Tali answered.

Garrus chuckled a little. 'Well. Both of you may have different protein structures and incompatible biochemistry, but I guess stupidity and bravado is a shared trait.' Tali had to smile. 'Tali, one of us needs to get to Shepard. Regardless of whoever we lose along the way, keep pushing for the beam. We're going to need some of that stupid really soon.'

'Well, Garrus, you know wh—'

Suddenly the intercom was flooded with static.

'Garrus! Do you read me?' She called frantically.

There was a burst of ear-piercing static. Then Garrus' voice came in, fragmented amidst the static. 'Front tank-(static)-blocking us. We can't get!-(static)-Reapers incoming! All units open-(static)'

'Garrus!' She yelled into her communicator as it went dead. She ran faster. Leaping over the last gap to the next building, she approached the remains of the last skyscraper, closest to the beam. Suddenly, she caught side of a sight that tore at her heart and caused whatever little blood was left in her body to drain from her face.

She glanced down over a wide-open square, littered with wreckage and corpses piled into bales like gruesome palisades. Around the beam was a numberless mass of Reapers, clawing and crawling over each other, like a massive pack of bloodthirsty rachni. And in their midst was a small group of Alliance tanks, surrounded by a thin band of people, unleashing a torrent of gunfire on the relentless horde. Flames rose from the wreckage of the forward tank, blocking the rest of the tank column, sealing the fate of her friends—his friends—so close to getting to him. It was the last stand of Shepard's squad. There was no way out.

_No, no, not you too. _

Her heart stayed at the edge of the roof, looking in stunned silence at the impending end of some of the only true friends she had known. Her legs carried the rest of her body upwards, up through the skyscraper, tearing her away from the carnage being wrought on her soul.

She found a service elevator at the end of the floor. Rusted and coated with detritus, it seemed ready to disintegrate at the slightest touch. She took a breath and stepped onto the platform. It held. Exhaling slowly, she pushed the button for the topmost floor. As the rickety platform ascended in jerky, erratic movements that sent chills through her, she reloaded her pistol.

_They are dying so that at least one of us can reach Shepard. _She gripped her gun tightly. It will not be for naught.

She reached the topmost floor—an abandoned, half-finished floor that seemed to have served as a construction headquarters, littered as it was with machinery.

She looked out the window straight ahead, right at the beam. Her eyes adjusted to the brightness, in time to register the dark shape headed straight in her direction.

The Harvester tore straight through the floor, ripping up cables and sweeping machinery up in its massive wings as it continued its crazed plunge into the building. Tali rolled swiftly to her right just as one of its wings clipped the service elevator and sent the unreliable machine plunging down the elevator shaft. She got to her feet just as the beast slid to a halt, and emptied her pistol into the unmoving pile of corrupted flesh. She kept tugging at the trigger even as the 'click click click' of an empty chamber rattled in the ensuing silence.

Her mind calmed down enough to register that the beast was dead. Without direct control of the Reapers, its mind had simply reverted to that of its original host, an organic creature that was corrupted and enslaved. The creature must have decided that its existence was no longer justified.

Tali looked at the path of destruction carved by the Harvester and moaned in hopelessness.

The beast had torn off almost the whole of the front of the office building, reducing the length of the floor by almost two thirds. Before, the beam would be within reach of a long jump from the edge of the building. Now, it was almost thirty feet away from the closest point Tali could reach to make a jump.

'_Keelah_…no…' She felt her will breaking. Thirty feet of thin air separated her from the only hope that Shepard had.

_Keelah'Selai. By the homeworld I hope to see someday_. Shepard had echoed her words, repeated the phrase back to her once Rannoch had been retaken, as they held hands and watched over a new world. She had snuggled up to his chest, wondering why he would use that phrase. Her homeworld was already hers, a new home to be shared between the Quarians and the Geth.

Then she realised that he wasn't talking about Rannoch.

_Look at all this destruction, Tali. This is the home of your lover. This is his future they are ravaging; his legacy they are ransacking; his dream they are robbing. _

_This is what he gave his life for._

_You are who he gave his life for._

Tali understood what she had to do.

She felt in her belt for the rounded, dense discs that she hoped not to use. Ghennix-class demolition charges, each one packing a concussive force measuring one-fourth that of a nuclear explosion, used to scissor key support structures rapidly. It was heavy-duty firepower, used by combat technicians to blow up enemy strongholds from within only when conventional explosives failed. One of these could bring down a building in eight seconds. _Two_ of these would kill her and leave enough of her remains to fit on a fingernail.

_Four_ of these just might be enough.

She calibrated the four discs with her omnitool, priming the magnetic plates, then ran over to the half-demolished elevator shaft, and tossed them down. At about halfway down the deep hole, the powerful electromagnets kicked in, and they stuck to the walls.

She then walked towards the beam, stopping at the very edge of what remained of the floor.

_You always said you were the stupidest guy to ever step aboard the Normandy. Today, Shepard, I break your record._

She detonated the explosives.

The building shook and trembled. Tali went deaf. The explosion was silent, almost like a little white noise that blotted out the world, and the weight of the mass of concrete and steel rebar remained in the air for a split second as if not daring to believe that it had just been obliterated.

Then it all began to fall apart.

Tali was forced down to her knees. She gripped the edge of the floor, even as the powerful explosion behind her began to push her forward at an alarming speed. She felt a thrill go through her spine.

The building was collapsing towards the beam.

_It's working._

She began to run, feeling the floor slip beneath her feet; losing traction. The beam was cutting right in front of her now, as the remains of the office floor crumbled and fell apart and the momentum from the explosion dissipated, she took a running jump, and launched herself into the midst of the blinding beam of light.

Brightness enveloped her.

_Keelah'Selai._

_I'm coming, Shepard._

* * *

Shepard spent the past fifteen minutes listening to a one-sided lecture on the dynamics of space-time interactions and the difference between fixed and unconstrained points in time. Only bits and pieces of it actually seeped into his brain. But his distrust of the man who called himself the Doctor was rapidly being overcome by his admiration of the machine that carried the both of them.

'So this means that your TARDIS machine can create and delete rooms any way you like?' Shepard interrupted the Doctor for the fourth time, which he did whenever something piqued his interest.

'Yes, of course. Um, now the laws of conservation of mass and energy do apply here, which means that at any one time the total energy of the TARDIS must be constant. Want a yogurt?' The Doctor extended an open cup of store-brand fruit yogurt to Shepard. His offer was met with a blank stare. 'Never mind. What this means is that with every room you make, the TARDIS needs to delete one or two in order to free up energy and mass.'

The Doctor beckoned Shepard to a door in the side of the central room; a door Shepard was sure wasn't there before. 'Now, I dragged you along on this little adventure for a few reasons. First of all, anything, _anything, _that threatens Earth is my business. Trust me when I say that I have eradicated entire _races _just so that my favourite race stays safe. So naturally I'll need anyone I can find who can give something of an edge in doing so, and you just happened to be sticking around. Secondly, well, your credentials with fighting the Reapers are impressive. Thus far.'

'Right. Thanks, I guess.' Shepard muttered.

The Doctor flashed a big grin. 'So I've done quite a bit of work to make sure you're comfortable as long as you stay here.' He turned the wooden knob of the door and swung it open inwards.

As much as he prided himself on self-control, Shepard couldn't stop his jaw from falling. He was standing in the doorway of a hotel room suite, complete with a mini-bar, a personal bathroom and an en-suite Jacuzzi. A holographic screen stood for a window, calmly displaying the soothing image of a starry night sky.

Shepard took a second glance at the bed and found that it was a queen-sized bed made for two, and came with two bath towels neatly folded and placed at the foot of each side. He raised an eyebrow at the Doctor.

'My dossier also suggests a love interest.' The Doctor flashed a winning smile. 'Considering that we don't know who we'd be picking up along the way, we might as well be ready.'

'Now, when you'd like to get a bit more hands-on and soldier-y, that door over there—' The Doctor pointed to a solid panel at the opposite end of the hotel suite, '—leads to your personal locker. I've stashed what's left of your arsenal in there, at least what you were carrying when I picked you up. Big gun, little guns, what-not, and whatever ammunition you have left. Be responsible for them. You take only what I allow you to take on each of our stops. Fire one bullet, anywhere, without my permission; I'll delete this entire room with you inside it. Trust me when I tell you that I'm doing you a _big _favour by allowing any firearms on my TARDIS at all.'

Shepard smirked dismissively. 'Well, well, for a pacifist you certainly know how to make threats. You already have the wacky fashion sense and drug-induced high; you just need a messed-up hairdo to complete the image.'

The Doctor smiled back. 'I'm not a pacifist. I simply know that the most dangerous and destructive weapon on this ship cannot be stored in a locker.'

'Really? And what's the most dangerous weapon, then?' Shepard played along.

The Doctor spoke simply. 'I am.'

He then clapped his hands together. 'Well! Hope you'll enjoy your little room. Make yourself at home! Mind you, I only had to delete my own personal room, the study, a banquet hall, and the Olympic-sized swimming pool, to make room for you. No trouble at all. Now!—' He pointed at Shepard's omnitool. 'I'll be using your nifty little gadget to send you updates, give you maps and little bits of information. Compile a codex, if you please. So do check it often. Like now, for instance.'

Shepard turned on his omnitool. A single block of text manifested above his gauntlet, glowing bright orange.

**OCTOBER 3, 1957**

**45.9 DEG NORTH; 63.3 DEG EAST (STANDARD EARTH)**

**SITE NO. 1**

He looked at the Doctor. 'We're going back in time. You told me all these points in time had something to do with the Reapers. What happened on October the third, 1957?'

The Doctor was back at the main controls. 'I honestly have no idea. We're in uncharted territory here. It's a blank point on the graph, which means that hundreds and hundreds of alternate scenarios and alternate universes could be birthed from whatever we accomplish—or fail to accomplish—on October 3, 1957. I know you're sick of hearing this, but take this to heart: _Be prepared for everything_.'

Shepard turned off the notification on his omnitool. He took a minute to make a quick check of all the systems. They worked perfectly.

'Hang on, Doctor.' He walked towards the centre of the room. 'My omnitool is working just fine. When we were at the Citadel, you told me you disabled it. How did you fix it?'

The Doctor smiled as he calibrated the TARDIS to prepare for the jump. 'It's quite simple. I used an ancient technique passed on for thousands and thousands of years.'

'What technique?' Shepard asked.

The Doctor smiled as he pulled the lever.

'It's called _bluffing._'

And the TARDIS sped into the unknown.

* * *

**Thank you so much for your favourites and reviews! I really hope to improve on my writing and give you something enjoyable. Looking forward to hearing from you!**

**Update (23 Oct 2012): Fixed an out-of-character problem with the Doctor's views on firearms. Many thanks to Torklan for pointing this out! Also changed the date given. May not seem like a major fix now, but will become significant soon. Thank you and please do enjoy!**


	5. Ch 5: October 3, 1957 (I)

**1800 LOCAL TIME**

**GIK-5 LC1 BAIKONUR COSMODROME**

**OCTOBER 3, 1957**

He used to hunt deer for a living. His friends at the bar imagined an hour-long affair, joking about how he would stride into the woods and a deer would simply throw itself before his gun in all glorious beauty; joking about how easy it was for him with his expert marksmanship and winning personality. In reality, he knew that the hunt was a relentless, nerve-straining battle of wits between the hunter and the denizens of the woods that would rather stay hidden. The culmination of the hunt may involve only three seconds between the rifle shot and the collapse of the beast; but such a moment came at the expense of tracking a prey through rain and sleet, hunting for prints and fresh droppings amidst the damp fog, building a profile of the animal's sleeping and feeding patterns, building and rebuilding deer blinds, sleeping amidst centipedes and teacup-sized spiders, always running the risk that it would all be an exercise in futility. It needed patience, and the iron will of discipline imposed upon the knee-jerk human instinct to seize an opportunity before it had ripened. It was a lifestyle that shaped him from toddler to teen to tracker; an intense schooling from nature's unrelenting force that had coloured his personality.

He thought wryly that he hadn't changed his career as a big game hunter. He just changed his quarry.

_Adjusting for elevation, windspeed, humidity, and the rotation of the earth, I have three seconds to put an end to the life of General Sergei Bondarenko, mastermind of the USSR's ballistic missile program._

_That's two and a half seconds more than necessary._

He peered through the scope and waited. He was issued with one of the cutting edge models of post-war military innovation—an experimental sniper rifle, never fielded before. He whittled it down to its minimum weight, swapped some parts for others, and spent days firing thousands of rounds downrange in practice sessions before he finally trusted it enough to serve him in the heat of battle. It was temperamental and unfamiliar, but worked beautifully once you get the hang of it; it was like one of the fiery lasses he'd meet down at the bar—hot, spicy and energetic, but you'd want to make sure you always stay aware of her antics.

He adjusted the scope and continued his vigil, waiting for the silver-grey car to show up on the highway leading to the launch site.

_There you are, Bondarenko. _The small silver speck of his limo appeared a click north, flanked by two black spots—army jeeps forming his security detail.

_Good sight downrange, no obstruction. Windspeed low, minimal compensation required. Gravity, humidity, air resistance, and the Coriolis Effect accounted for. Need to catch him right near the straight bend, when the leftmost jeep needs to switch lanes—then I'll have a perfect clear shot._

_One last thing._

_What the hell is that?_

* * *

Shepard holstered his Carnifex and checked his ammunition. The Doctor had allowed him only one more thermal clip. That made a grand total of twelve shots in his arsenal. _Twelve_. He ran through the same amount of ammunition thirty seconds into his mission at Rannoch.

The Doctor was happily adjusting his bowtie, sweeping his fringe back and whistling a happy tune. Hearing Shepard emerge from the room, he spun around on his heel. 'My, you look sharp, my friend!'

Shepard tugged at the sleeves of his jacket. It was a couple of sizes too large, pulled out from his personal wardrobe. Its cutting was drab and unimpressive; fashion from a century ago. Underneath, his Kassa Fabrications chestplate scraped uncomfortably against his body. He was allowed only one piece of armour for center-mass protection. He had never felt this exposed.

'Now, a bit of history here! October 3, 1957; a time of great turmoil. Two superpowers, controlling separate hemispheres of the globe, aren't getting along very well. This was a time of war. This was also when mankind began to stray beyond the limits of their imagination—their baby footsteps into the realm of the impossible. Technological innovation. Political transformation. Great, earthshaking things.' The Doctor wiped his lips with a striped handkerchief. 'A day from today, mankind will finally pierce the veil of space. The first work of the hands of man will enter the heavens. This is where it all begins. The space program. The colonies. Your First Contact War. The Council. The mass relays. The galactic war. The Reapers. This is where it all starts. With this one word: _Sputnik._'

The doctor paused. 'This is what the dossier tells us. This is what has _happened_. But I do not have the faintest idea what will take place today, on October 3, 1957.'

'What do you mean?' Shepard inquired, taking a step towards the doctor. 'You just said it yourself, history records what happens today.'

'History can be rewritten. Time can be rewritten.' The Doctor replied, not taking his eyes of the central screen. 'The question is: what are we to do? Do we rewrite history? Or prevent it from being rewritten? Where do the Reapers fit in? And most importantly,' he faced Shepard again. 'Will this change anything?'

'It has to.' Shepard affirmed simply.

The Doctor nodded. 'Now, onto the mission. Today, we'll wield the most powerful weapon any being can possess—one that can change planets and paint brushstrokes across the fabric of history. I trust you are familiar with _diplomacy_?'

Shepard smirked. 'More than you know. You'll be surprised how many friends I've made across the galaxy. They're almost as numerous as my enemies.'

'Good. Then sheath your pistol.' The Doctor ordered. 'You can't shake hands with a clenched fist. Or a fist carrying a pistol.'

Shepard grunted, and holstered his Carnifex. 'Right. I'll trust you this once. You're sure it won't be needed?' The pair began walking towards the door.

'Come on, now!' The Doctor chirped cheerily, turning the door handle. 'My experience has taught me that firearms are never a way to greet a guest.'

They walked out of the TARDIS into the iron sights of at least thirty assault rifles pointing their way.

* * *

The sniper blinked twice. His eyes were sharp; he could put a bullet right into the head of a thumb tack from a mile away. And hence, he was absolutely sure, despite the vehement protests of logic and common sense that a bright blue police box had just warped right into the middle of the Baikonur facility.

_Am I going senile so soon? _

He pulled his mind back to the task at hand. It was a habit of rigid discipline cultivated over years—to blot out the evidence of your senses, however ridiculous, and take only information you need to complete the mission.

_The base is now on full alert. Bondarenko's car is now one hundred meters from the base. This means that if I take the shot, I'll have about five minutes to clear out of at least a square kilometer of treacherous open land before an artillery strike, a helicopter, or a patrol team—or maybe all three—sends me back home with a posthumous Medal of Honor._

He collapsed his sniper rifle and stashed it back in his makeshift blind. From the same stash, he picked out a pistol and a ballistic knife. He strapped a gas mask to his face, and clipped two small canisters to his hip. They contained the agency's latest sick idea; a potent nerve gas that attacked the central nervous system via kinase pathways. Odourless, colourless, and untraceable, the gas would cause no immediate effect on anyone inhaling it; about thirty minutes later, the subject would collapse from rigor mortis—leading to death by suffocation. That meant thirty minutes for him to get out safely and be a long, long way from the base.

He moved quickly and silently away from the blind and down a hidden trail towards the facility.

_Plan B. Up close and personal._

* * *

The Doctor grinned inanely at the line of grim, dark-faced soldiers gripping the stocks of their assault rifles. 'Well, _privet_, my comrades! Having a pleasant day?'

Shepard cursed. Slowly, he eased his hand to his side. If he drew the pistol quickly, he could put a round or two into a few soldiers, and in the ensuing melee they could have enough time to steal away back onto the TARDIS.

Then an officer stepped forward. Built like an ox, his eyes were deep set and his thin mouth was accentuated by a five-o'-clock shadow. Pulling out his service revolver, he aimed it straight at Shepard.

'Wouldn't try that now. Hands in the air.'

Shepard raised his hands. In spite of his situation, he felt a jarring sense of disconnect at hearing the officer's voice. It was as if the words weren't really spoken; rather, he heard sounds, and somehow his brain managed to register these sounds into words, tones and inflections all by its own.

'The TARDIS's translation matrix.' The Doctor looked at his surprised face and answered his unasked question. 'They are speaking Russian. The matrix captures the intonations and translates them into the language you understand the best. It works both ways as well. Comrades!'—he called out cheerfully—'I am here on official business for the Kremlin. I am, erm, Doctor Vrach! This here is Commissar Shepard; we are here to investigate an anomaly at this facility. A marvelous facility, I might add.' He flashed what looked like a blank piece of paper at the officer's stony face.

'We did not receive word of any visit from the Kremlin.' The officer lowered his weapon, but kept his eyes firmly fixed on Shepard's. 'Your methods of entry are—unprecedented. However you managed to enter our facility in that—box—is irrelevant. Your man here,' he gestured to Shepard, 'attempted to pull a weapon on personnel in service of the Soviet Union, which casts much doubt on your allegiances. I'm afraid I shall have to defer to my superior to confirm your identity. In the event that he does not vouch for you,' the officer took a threatening step towards the Doctor, 'the dogs in our kennels have not been fed for six days. Food is scarce, and we cannot deny them rations that arrive so conveniently.' He motioned to his men. They formed a line behind the duo, their guns still raised. 'Follow me. General Bondarenko has just arrived. Pray that he knows who you are and wants you here.'

Shepard stepped forward first, the Doctor close behind. They walked behind the burly officer to the command center. Up ahead, a limousine had just entered the facility through the heavily guarded gate, flanked by two army jeeps. As it pulled up near the command center, an aide deftly stepped forward to open the car door, and the sole passenger stepped out.

General Bondarenko was at least fifty years old, and was bore the look of a man who spent the better part of his youth in the worst part of the world. His average stature was balanced by his stocky build which filled his military uniform like a bullet fills a casing. As he straightened and stepped forward, the glittering brass on his uniform jingled ominously. He spared no sign of attention towards the officer.

'Comrade-General.' The officer spoke. 'I trust your journey has been pleasant. Several matters await your attention.'

'All good, Lieutenant Alenko.' The general replied nonchalantly as his aide handed him a brief of files that he began to peruse at once. 'The great engine of Soviet industry has deemed it necessary for me, a veteran of Stalingrad, Seelow and Berlin, to spend the better part of my career in a dusty corner of a forsaken desert so that my superiors can beat the Americans in a long-range fireworks contest.'

_The officer's name is Alenko. _Shepard noted dryly. _What are the odds of that?_

'I have two men here, who managed to infiltrate our facility through yet-unknown means. Soldiers on duty claim to have seen a box appear out of thin air. They call themselves Vrach and Shepard. I defer to your judgment on how best to deal with them.' Lieutenant Alenko spoke crisply. He spoke of their sudden and inexplicable entry with no hint of hesitation or astonishment, as if reading off the headline of a newspaper.

The general's response was less temperate. 'Infiltrators? So now I have to advise you on how best to deal with Western spies?' He stared directly at Shepard and spoke without emotion. 'I'm in a good mood today. Tell me how best you wish to die. I'll do my utmost to make sure that your wishes are disregarded.'

Alenko had already drawn his service revolver and was aiming it at Shepard.

Shepard breathed deeply. Things were going south quickly. He racked his brains to recall his N7 training, on situational control and negotiation. _Alright, just keep him interested. Get him to listen to you, if not trust you. Buy some time._

'General Bondarenko, my name is Commissar Shepard. This is my associate.' He turned to the Doctor, who was mouthing vehemently _associate? _'We are here on official business of the—Soviet Union. We suspect a case of possible sabotage here at your facility.'

Bondarenko cocked his head and looked at Shepard. 'I know a ruse when I hear one. But let's say I believe you. Humour me. What do you suppose you know about this facility and what we do?'

'Project _Sputnik_, General. Your great leap in your space program. The first man-made object to enter orbit?' Shepard replied, meeting Bondarenko's gaze straight-on. His demeanor changed; Bondarenko straightened up, losing his disinterested air. Alenko had lowered his revolver, and his eyes were darting from the general to the interloper, feeling the new change in the situation. The Doctor looked visibly impressed; Shepard felt smug at his surprise that he had managed to retain this much information. His training had served him well for his years in N7; it had just done so again.

'That is classified, Commissar, if one you indeed are. I suppose you are who you say you are, after all. Come with me; you may brief me on this—sabotage—you speak of.' The General beckoned to them as he walked up the stairs of the command center; Bondarenko holstered his revolver and followed the trio as they made their way up.

'Of course, General. My associate here is vastly more well-informed; I am simply here to provide credence. Perhaps he would be better suited to enlighten you.' Shepard motioned to the Doctor, to whom Bondarenko had turned his eyes and his full attention. The Doctor cast Shepard a withering look before speaking in an upbeat tone.

'Well, General, let me put it this way. What we have now are time-traveling, intergalactic space robots descending on Earth to destroy it about two hundred years from now. Today, there is something, or someone, in this facility that can help us prevent this. I need you to help me find it.' The Doctor finished, snapping the strap on his bowtie.

The guards nearby exchanged meaningful looks as they snapped the safety off their rifles. Alenko had taken a few steps closer to them already. Shepard took a deep breath. He wondered how long the Soviets tortured their prisoners before execution.

The general turned around, his face solemn. For a long time, no one spoke. Shepard scanned his face, expecting at any moment to see a smirk manifest, before a noncommittal gesture from the general sent soldiers running to execute them summarily.

Instead, Bondarenko spoke simply, his voice level and laden with meaning. 'Come with me. I need to show you something.'

* * *

It was massive. Before them, a stone monolith rose about fifty feet from the floor of the lab facility, poking out from between towers of primitive computer servers and laboratory paraphernalia. It was dark brown, seemingly ancient, yet covered with thousands of symbols Shepard couldn't recognise. Only six or seven personnel, clad in lab coats, were manning the room. The doors were shut and sealed with reinforced steel. Alenko stood guard at the door, turning his surly face to the duo.

The general motioned towards the stone monument. 'This was unearthed when we began work on this site. We found it directly beneath the facility, buried under bedrock, as we were laying the foundation. For months I have been going to and from the Kremlin, attempting to hide it, attempting to keep it a secret. No one must know of this, no one. These seven men and women have been selected from our best scientists, and are bound to secrecy upon pain of death. Alenko has orders to execute all personnel who correspond with anyone outside this facility.'

'Why the secrecy?' Shepard asked, as he gazed upwards, attempting to decipher the cryptic symbols. They weren't in any language he knew; then again, his comprehension of old-Earth tongues was limited at best. 'I can't read any of it.'

'Unfortunately, I can.' Bondarenko turned to Shepard and the Doctor. 'The script is Cyrillic, the written language of Russia. What is written is both exhilarating and—horrifying.'

The general began to circle the stone monument, and pointed at the base of the monolith. 'It describes events from the past, dating from the time of Catherine the Great. Everything up till now is recorded in stunning detail: dates, times, locations of major events. Names, numbers, even life histories. It chronicles the birth of our nation.'

Then he gestured towards the middle of the monument. 'Then it went on. It told us of things, great things. How Mother Russia would rise up to be a great power. It foretold how we defeated the Axis powers and vanquished Hitler. It told us of Yuri Gagarin, the first man to conquer space. We rejoiced as we completed transcription of the monolith's script up to that point. There seemed no end to what we would, and could, achieve. The script had been right thus far! Whatever the means, supernatural or otherwise, another mystic force had written the glory of our empire—past, present and future—into stone for all to see.'

Bondarenko's face darkened. 'What came next was the reason that I had twenty personnel executed immediately and destroyed thousands of shelves' worth of data.'

'The monolith described the fall of the Soviet Union. How the conflict with the United States would play out. How communism would eventually fall, supplanted by capitalism, and our glorious empire would fragment and splinter. One of my top scientists begged to be shot on the spot once he had finished transcribing this portion. I consented and did the act myself.'

Shepard felt a chill run down his back.

Bondarenko pointed straight to the top of the monolith. 'The peak of the monument is the final piece of the chronicle. It describes how the Earth would unite, how one world order would come to be. The script tells of an Earth council, a single governing body. And, more fantastically, it tells of other races. Other beings, beyond the stars, coming to Earth to make contact; and our own people leaving Earth for worlds unknown.'

The general pointed to the base of the monument again, and put his finger at a red line Shepard had not noticed before. As Shepard peered at it, he could distinguish more symbols, written in minute script.

'This red line tells of another tale. It speaks of a terrible force, eons and eons in the making, behind the workings of human history. From the time of Catherine and the Tsars, up till the advent of the Soviet Union. It speaks of humans, great and small, dangled like puppets in service of a terrifying power. See how the line snakes up the monument, coiling like a snake? See how this force entangles all of our history, all of our people? This is why I believe you and your tale of terrible creatures, ridiculous as it may seem.'

Then Bondarenko took them behind the monument. 'From this angle, you can see where the line terminates. It ends right at the tip, near a shape carved into the rock. The script stops there. The final lines tell of humanity's end and the last breath of the world.'

The red line snaked upwards, and entered the mouth of a conical carving that encapsulated the tip of the monolith. Shepard did not need to understand Cyrillic. He recognised the shape of a Reaper when he saw one.

The general lapsed into silence. Shepard and the Doctor took a few steps away and began to converse.

'That was a Reaper, I'm sure of it. I see the Reapers' influence here, even now.' Shepard enthused. 'They have been here for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. They had infiltrated us.'

'Yes, but why?' The Doctor replied in an equally urgent tone. 'You told me how the Reapers destroyed hundreds of worlds in the span of weeks. Why then are they playing cloak-and-dagger with Earth? Why infiltrate and control, when you can harvest and destroy?'

'Unless…' Shepard spoke, before pausing. 'Unless we aren't just another race to be harvested. We are important, somehow, in their whole twisted plan. They were playing us. The indoctrinated people, the Illusive Man, they controlled everything.' Shepard glanced around. 'There could be indoctrinated people around us, right now.'

The Doctor was looking at his arm, oblivious to Shepard.

'Doctor?' Shepard asked, trying to get his attention.

'Look.' The Doctor pointed to his arm. Near his wrist, a tally sign had appeared. It was the symbol for eight.

'Look at your own arm.' The Doctor pointed to Shepard. He glanced at his wrist. Another tally sign was there, which Shepard was sure he had never written: four.

They both looked back at the Doctor's wrist. The tally sign had increased: fourteen.

'What is this?' Shepard hissed.

'What this means,' the Doctor spoke, quietly and ominously, 'is that we are in very, very big trouble.'

'General!' Shepard shouted suddenly, as he spotted movement.

A figure had appeared on the walkway above the facility, clad in a black suit and a gas mask. As the general spun around, the figure leapt off the walkway, and the small black shape of a handgun appeared in its hand.

Shepard's own hand reached for the Carnifex as he sprinted for the general. He knew, almost instantly, that he was far too late.

A gunshot rang out. Slowly, Bondarenko crumpled, a dark stain appearing over his breast. The medals on his uniform jingled once more as he hit the floor; their polished metal gleamed with fresh blood. A punctured canister clattered down next to Bondarenko, spewing forth its colourless contents in a faint hiss.

As the assassin made his own landing, Shepard kept his momentum up. His arms outstretched, he crashed straight into the figure, slamming him onto the ground. Ripping the gas mask off, Shepard slammed his fist over and over into the attacker's face. Then, gripping him by the collar, he hauled him to his feet and shouted.

'Who are you? Who do you work for?'

Through the blood streaming from his broken nose, the assassin coughed and smiled. His eyes were blue. Shepard recognised the specific shade of blue and understood, even before the assassin spoke his reply:

_Assuming direct control._

* * *

**Thank you for reading! My sincere apologies for the long delay in updating; several other commitments and university assignments had to be settled. Hope you enjoyed this first of two parts to this one episode. **


	6. Ch 6: The Silence of Memory (II)

**3 JULY 1957**

**1900 HOURS 23 MINUTES**

**SOUTH WING OF BAIKONUR FACILITY**

The sky was red with the bloody hue of sunset. Long, angular shadows stretched across the landscape, cast by the ailing sunlight breaking and scattering through the opaque cloud layer.

_All callsigns, this is Headman. You know your mission. _The radio command echoed through five earpieces tuned to the same frequency.

At the south end of the facility, two figures clad in desert camouflage broke from behind cover of a boulder and made their way up the ridge of a cliff, thirty meters from the south side of the Soviet facility. As one of them raised his weapon, scanning the ridgeline for threats, the other man prepared the hydraulic gun. He examined the façade of the nearest building, seeking a stairwell, catwalk or low rooftop that could serve as an entry point.

'Hurry up, Mirage.' His partner hissed.

Mirage selected the doorway of a fire escape leading into the building. He turned on his communicator and spoke.

_All units, our entry point will be the third floor of Building 12. Lupus and I will take point. Digger and Hamfist, take the zipline once we give the all-clear. _

He fired the gun. The grappling hook soared across the dry air in a neat arc, catching neatly on the edge of the roof directly above their entry point. As Mirage collapsed the hydraulic gun, he nodded to Lupus. 'Prepare the door gift.'

Lupus smiled through his mask. The bolt slid neatly into the groove of his crossbow. With a tiny flick of his finger, he snapped the miniscule switch on the crossbow head to prime the bolt. Taking aim, he fired. The bolt took flight and hit the door with a solid 'thunk,' the tiny blinking light of the miniature explosive winking back at him. The detonation would be powerful, but focused; the door would be blown clean off, without dislodging the grappling hook above it.

_Mirage, Lupus, be advised. You've got activity on the other side of the door. Two, no, three hostiles. _Digger's voice came over the intercom.

Mirage drew his weapon from its holster. The MAT-49 was French-made, a stable, reliable submachine gun that had seen much service in arenas worldwide. The stock slipped neatly into the crook of his shoulder, and his grip closed easily over the handle. With his free hand, he secured the hook to the zipline. 'Let's roll.'

'Right behind you.' Lupus responded, flashing a thumbs-up. The remote detonator sat firmly in his palm.

Mirage took a flying leap off the edge of the cliff for added momentum. The hook caught and he began accelerating down the zipline like a squirrel. He felt a second jolt of tension in the line—Lupus was on his way down.

Halfway across the line, Lupus triggered the detonator. With a sharp bang, the crossbow bolt detonated, slamming the door inwards like a punch. From within the room, cries of surprise and alarm echoed.

Mirage released his grip on the hook as soon as he was past the doorway. The silhouettes of three guards armed with assault rifles appeared ahead. Carried onwards by momentum, he flew through the doorway, his shoulder slamming into the bony forehead of a Russian guard. The two remaining guards were drawing their rifles. His gun went up just as his free hand grasped the stock for support. Two sharp cracks split the air as the guards went down under his fire. He checked the third guard; the concussive force of the blow had effectively neutralised him.

_All units, this is Mirage. The entry point is secure. Headman, requesting sniper overwatch as we search the facility for Target One. _Mirage reported back to the team. Lupus had entered the room, and quickly moved to the doorways, checking the perimeter.

'Mirage, check this. We're lucky.' Lupus was standing in the doorway of an adjacent room. Six or seven screens lined the wall, showing grainy black-and-white images of the numerous rooms in the facility. 'The Reds have got one of these closed-circuit television systems. Cameras taking shots of the entire facility. Must have pilfered the tech off the Krauts once Berlin was taken.' Taking the controls, he ran through the different shots of the cameras. Personnel milling about, guards changing positions, large empty rooms filled with ominous-looking canisters…

'There.' Mirage stopped him. The shot was of a long hallway. The jerky, erratic framerate was nevertheless clear enough for him to identify four figures—a general, decked in full uniform; the large, imposing figure of an officer; a figure in a jacket; and a man that stood out like a sore thumb, his gait light and springy unlike the heavy steps of his three companions. As Mirage continued to view the footage, one of the four men turned to the odd figure, and seemed to be speaking.

'Rewind that.' Mirage watched closely. Between the two grainy frames from the abysmally low capture rate of the camera, Mirage could see the shape of the man's mouth move in pronunciation of a word. He mimicked the movements, attempting to form sounds, linking the syllables together.

'Or…der. Oh, door. Doe…'

And suddenly, it clicked.

He turned to Lupus. 'How long ago was this?'

'Fifteen minutes. Wait, let me check—no one has left the room yet. They're still inside.'

Mirage turned on his comms.

_All callsigns, we have eyes on Target One, in the north wing of the facility, room 627. I repeat, we have our target. The Doctor is here._

* * *

**EXPERIMENTAL ROOM NO. 627**

**BAIKONUR NORTH WING**

**2000 HOURS 12 MINUTES**

Darkness. Complete lack of sight. Confusion. Noise.

Then, light.

Shepard found himself in a crouching position, behind an overturned table. His pistol was in hand. He checked the heat sink. It was almost depleted.

Something wasn't right.

With a quick glance, he surveyed the room. He stood in the midst of a scene of utter chaos. Chairs were flung haphazardly, and an overturned table lay to his front, its patina singed and burnt. His mind worked slowly. He forced it to work harder.

_What happened?_

There was a general. He died. Someone killed him. They caught the killer.

He looked at the ground. The body of General Bondarenko lay on the floor, a single bullet hole piercing one of the numerous medals on his uniform. Rivulets of dried blood remain frozen, radiating from the wound.

He glanced at his gauntlet, tucked neatly under his jacket sleeve. A timer was running, set for half a minute before a program would run. He couldn't recall setting such a program. He considered terminating the program, but a hacking cough distracted him.

Several feet away, the Doctor was getting to his feet. He was covered head-to-toe in dust, and stood wearily to his aching feet. He coughed once more, and glanced at the SONIC screwdriver somehow in his hand. Some signal was struggling to reach his brain. Some memory was out of reach.

_Something's not right._

From behind the bulk of a computer processing unit, a third man stood up warily. He bore a look of utter bewilderment. As Shepard looked at this interloper, he realised that he was badly beaten up.

Then, without warning, they both heard the click of a revolver being cocked.

Lieutenant Alenko had his revolver trained on Shepard.

'Alenko, wh-what?' Shepard asked blankly.

Alenko's face was of a man possessed. Every fibre of his visage seemed to struggle against the gun held in his hand, as if willing his own body to release the firearm. His gun remained firmly in his hand. It was as if he had lost control of everything beyond his right shoulder.

The Doctor remembered first. A half-formed, vague shadow of a recollection stirring in his mind.

'Alenko, look at me. Look at me.' He pleaded, trying to get the burly lieutenant's attention. 'You are not yourself. This is not what you want to do. There is a signal in your brain, a foreign signal, willing you to do this. Recognise it. Reject it. It is in your power.'

Alenko's fingers twitched. For a second, his gun nearly slipped from his grasp…

Then the doors burst open.

Four figures emerged from the doorway, moving with lightning speed and clockwork precision. Shepard instinctively drew his weapon. Instantly, two of the figures aimed their own firearms at him. They were clad in full black, their faces obscured by balaclavas. Outnumbered and outgunned, Shepard decided to drop his pistol, opening his palms to show that he was otherwise unarmed. The remaining two figures trained their weapons on the Doctor.

One of them spoke, clicking on his communicator. _Headman, this is Mirage. We have eyes on the Doctor. Two hostiles present. Target is secure. Request changing order to capture._

_Negative. Kill him. _Headman's voice came on Mirage's communicator.

Mirage felt uneasy. This was not how they did things. _Say again, Headman, our orders were to execute kill/capture on the Doctor. We can take him in alive and get him out. The Doctor is primary intel material._

_Kill him, Mirage. That's an order._ Headman repeated. Mirage had never heard him this agitated.

_With due respect, field operational protocol states—_

_KILL HIM! _Headman burst into a scream.

Mirage's three companions thrust their weapons forward.

Alenko's gun remained trained on Shepard.

Shepard stood, unarmed, defenseless, and useless.

And instantly the Omnitool blinked to life.

* * *

**1900 HOURS 58 MINUTES**

**FOURTEEN MINUTES AGO**

**PRIOR TO SILENCE AMNESIAC CLASS ONE ANOMALY (SACOA)**

Shepard's hands were on the assassin's collar. Next to him, Bondarenko had gone still, the warmth of perfused skin replaced by the cool pallor of death. He kicked away the man's pistol and gas mask with a single stroke of his foot.

Shepard dragged the stunned man to his feet. With his right foot, he snagged the leg of a nearby chair, dragged it closer, and shoved him into it. The man's limp body hit the back of the chair with an audible crack. He showed no intention of struggling.

Shepard turned around. Alenko was marching forward, his service revolver once again thrust forward at the seated prisoner. Shepard moved to block him.

'We need him alive. We need to know what he knows!'

'You American _dog_!' Alenko roared. As he wheeled around on Shepard, Shepard realised that he wasn't talking about the prisoner.

'_Enough!_' A voice thundered through the air like the blast of a shotgun, stunning both men. Somehow, Alenko was compelled to lower his gun. The Doctor marched up to Alenko. 'Someone just murdered your general in the midst of a maximum security facility. Something is controlling him. Whatever used him as a tool is also moving in on us right now, which means the entire facility is compromised. We need to find out everything we can from him. So put your gun away _at once._' He punctuated his demand with a jab to Alenko's nose.

His words were met with a glare of cold fury. 'I know not if your geography is rusty, but you are in our territory. I can order the flesh flayed from your bones and the men under my command will do it in the most painful way possible. Do not. Attempt. Power plays. With me.' He poked the barrel of the gun into the Doctor's chest. 'You have five minutes. After that, I kill this dog. If you attempt to stop me, I shoot you in the kneecaps. And after that, I will kill you. Slowly.' He put his gun down at last. 'Your time starts now.'

Shepard moved in, pushing Alenko aside and pulling the Doctor away from the stare-off. He moved to the prisoner. A sound was emanating from his parted lips. As Shepard drew closer, he realised that the man was giggling softly.

Shepard yanked the man's chin up roughly. Brilliant blue eyes gleamed from sunken sockets. The glowing pupils followed Shepard's own eyes vigilantly.

_-Shepard-_

He recognised the voice before he heard the words. It was a voice that could not be here, now, hundreds of years before the Reapers were even discovered. Memories returned unbidden; a voice speaking through several mouths and hundreds of shells, corridors swarming with Collectors glowing with the same shade of blue. It was the voice of the first Reaper—the first offspring of the Catalyst, the forebear of the final solution to the synthetic-organic conflict.

'**Harbinger**.'

Shepard stared the man squarely in his eyes. 'I know who you are.'

A cold, rasping voice answered him. The man's lips were not moving. It was issuing from inside his body.

_-You have always been in our way. Time after time, you arrive to destroy our cleansing work. You would even violate the laws of time itself to go back to stop us.-_

_-There is no positive outcome. There is no glorious future of coexistence. There is only the inevitable, and the directive that we enforce to delay it. –_

'You aren't supposed to be here yet. Not now, not for another couple of centuries. I met you sometime in the twenty-second century.' Shepard was struggling to put the pieces together.

The man smirked at Shepard, an unnatural smile that stretched the lips as if with an invisible wire.

_-We are the apex of intelligence. Our knowledge is limitless, unbound by the shackles of space and time. I simply exist—through space, across time. And with me, the Reapers exist. While your feeble mind grasps at straws to perceive the intricacies of time, we see it all at a glance. Nothing changes. Salvation is possible only through preservation.-_

The Doctor was suddenly at Shepard's side. Grabbing their captive by the collar, he shook him roughly and demanded. 'Enough riddles, now tell us. How is the Silence involved in this?'

The prisoner stared at the Doctor and smiled.

_-We are all one—We are the Reapers.-_

The Doctor whipped out his green glowing pen and pointed it straight at the prisoner. It emitted a faint chirrupy buzz. A second later the prisoner's body seized up; a sound of quaking agony escaped from his throat.

'You are a program. Nothing more than a pathetic consciousness residing in the mortal bodies of creatures long gone by. You have no form, no hope, no soul. And in your shell; in this frail body of a frail human, you are weak enough for me to take control.' The Doctor's usual bouncy speaking tone was gone, replaced once again with a steely voice of cool controlled wrath. The blue glow in the prisoner's eyes was suddenly replaced by a flare of bright green. 'Now answer me.'

Shepard looked at the Doctor, his continuing disbelief mounting. _Did this man just assume direct control of __**Harbinger**__?_

The Doctor spoke. 'Tell me now. Where are the Silence?'

The man was still giggling. He did not appear to be fazed by the fact that the Doctor had seized control; in fact, he relished it. Shepard had the sinking feeling that they were still playing Harbinger's game.

_-You fool. Twenty, thirty. Fifty. Sixty. They are all about, they roam this facility, they control the fingers of the scientists at their little instruments and the lips of the generals in their war rooms; they are everywhere and yet nowhere, because your memories have no stronger grasp on them as the grasp of a hand on the mist of the air. In fact, your eyes have beheld the Silence three times already.- _

'Impossible.' The Doctor hissed.

-_You believe it impossible? You walked from the outside of the facility right into this room, not perceiving the small gaps in your memory, the little whispers of commands that compelled Bondarenko to lead you here. And now, you are right where they want you.-_

'Where are they?' The Doctor's composure was slipping. He shook the prisoner, almost as if trying to dislodge the answer from his lips before it was spoken.

The prisoner paused for a long, strained second. Then, Harbinger spoke.

_-Look up.-_

Wordlessly, the Doctor raised his head. Shepard did the same, and his hand went to the gun at his hip almost before his mind registered the sight.

The catwalk above them was full of figures in suits. Tall, gaunt men—no, not men. These were not human. Their faces were warped, twisted abominations of flesh, twirling around their oval skulls like surrealist fantasies. Their fingers were long, like the roots of shrunken dead trees. And as they gazed wordlessly at the men below, one figure stepped forward from their midst.

Shepard's body was flooding with adrenaline. 'Doctor, there're fifteen, twenty targets up there. They have us surrounded.' Shepard's Carnifex was raised—he scanned the mass of suits. They were definitely hostile, yet did not appear to be armed. They gazed on him with eyes, but the eyes were in the wrong places—could they see? Did they need to? He kept his pistol trained on them, switching targets intermittently, knowing that his gun was an empty threat against the strength of numbers and the veil of ignorance—he had absolutely no idea what these beings were capable of.

About three meters behind them, Alenko surveyed the scene, the revolver hanging limply at his side. His chin was trembling. He had long lost any sense of comprehension towards the incoherent events that had dominated his day. He simply stared upwards, his eyes falling on the figure that was now closest to them. The suited creature stood on the walkway directly above the monolith, which rose up under him like a silent testament to the power of their collective will.

The creature spoke, and from its face without mouth or orifice, another voice issued forth. It was cold and unfeeling, devoid of the subtle inflections peculiar to normal human speech. _We have been, and always have been. We are the ones who shaped your destiny, who dangled you like marionettes on strings. _The voice rumbled like the low whisper of some malevolent entity infesting the air.

A demented, sickly sound rumbled among the masses of figures clustered on the catwalk. Shepard realised that the sound was _laughter._

Spreading wide its arms, the creature gestured to the massive monument below it. _Behold, and despair. This monolith was carved not five hundred years ago; down to the single last detail, by the hands of stone workers who laboured day and night for a work that they forgot altogether the second they completed it. Why, you ask, does it tell the future so brilliantly, so accurately? It is simple. _

Shepard turned briefly to glance at the Doctor. 'Doc, you better have a plan.' He edged closer. 'What's he saying? Time travel, just like you? Can they do that?'

The sound of otherworldly laughter echoed once more, spreading like a slow groan through the room.

_We have no need of futile contraptions to divine the future. The future is as we will it. Five hundred years ago, we inscribed our plans for the coming millennium, and behold, it had surely become so._ _Our power is great, our influence vast—the future had always been ours to shape! _

_And your discovery of our monument—we engineered it too. You humans shine under oppression, under slavery. You are prone to great feats of heroics and compassion._

_Yet grant you but a small measure of power—technology centuries ahead of its time, or, like this monument, knowledge of events to come—and the corruption within you tears your own vision to shreds. You now see the fall of your empire; the destruction of your dreams and your peoples' republic. And, in your blindness, you would strike first to avoid your fate. What better weapon to use, that one that can travel to the stars above? The first man-made satellite, the conquest of space! What leader can possibly forfeit the tactical advantage such a weapon offered him? _

Alenko's knuckles went white as he tightened his grip on the revolver. 'You were playing General Bondarenko. You tried to subvert him, get him to turn Sputnik into a weapon against the Western Allies.' Alenko stared directly at the figure that he recognised as the leader of the pack. 'What is it? A bomb, like the ones America used on Japan? You would wipe out an entire city just to advance your mad cause?'

The creature turned its head towards Alenko, slowly and deliberately, as if the lieutenant was barely worthy of its attention.

_Human, ask the race that had destroyed Atlantis, orchestrated the Holocaust, and buried Cahokia beneath a mile of rock, whether the loss of a city weighs heavily upon its conscience._

Alenko muttered a curse in Russian.

The creature spoke again, as if intent on tormenting its listeners with knowledge gained far too late.

_Bondarenko became too clever for his own good. He eventually figured out how to retain the few memories that he had of his encounters with us. Have you wondered why he keeps his medals on his person at all times? One of them contains a tiny voice recorder, wired to an earpiece he wears with him at all times. He checks it every hour, on the hour, for his messages to himself. An altercation here, an encounter there—soon, he pieced together these vague, half-remembered fragments of memory. _

_He not only deduced our existence; he made an impressive guess of our plans. He began to make trips to the Kremlin, lobbying for the Sputnik project to be delayed. He was intelligent, far beyond that of most of your kind, I would add—he managed to trick even himself. On the surface, he believed himself to be a pragmatist, attempting to shelve a project that would only drain resources at the expense of other priorities. No doubt, I admit that he managed to fool even us, as we assumed initially that the reason for the delay was bureaucratic red tape. _

_Underneath, through repetition and recall, he had programmed himself to oppose the Sputnik project at all cost, to avoid the future that we had scripted for his nation._

'A smart man.' The Doctor remarked. 'I do recall myself coming up with something similar to ensure that I could remember you.' He gave Shepard a meaningful look. Somehow, he managed to project the entirety of his intentions into a single facial gesture—and Shepard understood.

'So you killed Bondarenko.' Alenko's voice was raised now. 'Doubtless you will have another puppet ready, to carry out this madness of yours.'

The creature's head tilted to one side, like that of a condescending parent beholding a petulant child. _Bondarenko could no more have stopped us than you could have stopped his murder. Our next—candidate—for the space project, is not only completely pliable, but complicit in our schemes. The Sputnik project had been executed already behind the veil of secrecy—Bondarenko's efforts merely slowed it down. _

_As we speak, your own comrades and colleagues move fuel tanks, check electronics, and prepare for the launch in a few hours' time—obeying orders they cannot recall, following imperatives implanted into them over and over since they have worked in this facility. _

_Upon entering orbit, Sputnik will reach the Eastern Seaboard of the United States of America in just under eight hours. And then—well, let's just say it will be an opera worthy of a global audience._

'You will not escape unpunished. I will stop this madness if it's the last thing I do.' Vehemently, Alenko pointed a finger at the alien.

A second ripple of discordant laughter spread through the assembled otherworldly figures.

The suited monster leaned forward, like a curious old man. _How would you punish what you cannot remember? Your mind is fragile, and so easily bent to the will of creatures greater than you are. All it takes is a command from us, and you will obey it the instant that we vanish from your memory._

The beast extended one long, spindly finger at Alenko.

_Our first message to you, Lieutenant Alenko. When we leave your sight, you will kill both of these men. Then you will put your gun to your head and self-terminate._

The ominous sentence echoed in the silent air. The Doctor's face turned pale. Shepard turned to look at Alenko.

Alenko's face was stern and solid. His left hand remained in the air, his finger still extended. Then it fell back down to his side, limp. For a moment he was silent.

'I too have a message, from Mother Russia.'

Then his right hand came up—revolver in grip.

'Go to hell.'

The sound of the gunshot rippled through the hall. The bullet emerged straight, leaving a trail of thin vapour in its wake.

With an explosion of clear fluid, the shot punctured the eye of the strange being. Instantly, its body went rigid; it somehow remained standing, kept suspended by the sheer force of hydrostatic shock. Then the body crumpled.

Shepard instinctively moved backwards. 'Well, here we go. That concludes negotiations.'

Immediately, a guttural roar filled the hall, as the suited alien figures raised their impossibly long arms in wild rage. The lights above the corridor sputtered, flickered, and then died out. Almost instantly, another light took its place; a cold, blue electrical glow pooling around the creatures' hands and growing ever more intense.

'They're charging up for an attack! Get down!' The Doctor shouted, scrambling for the cover of a nearby table.

Shepard moved quickly; seizing the edges of a hard wooden table, he upended it and flipped it sideways to create a makeshift barricade. He ducked behind it just as the first burst of blue electricity flashed over him.

Alenko had no intention whatsoever of taking cover. Roaring with unbridled rage, he opened fire again and again. His wrath was blinding, but it did not cloud his accuracy. With a high-pitched cry, one creature tumbled over the railing, its torso pierced twice by his bullets. A bolt of blue energy missed his face. Barely flinching, he repaid the gesture with a single bullet. It zipped open the top of a creature's misshapen head, raining fluid over its corrugated face.

He cocked the hammer and pulled the trigger again. A disdainful click answered him. His gun was empty.

Just then, a rough hand seized his collar and forced him to his knees, behind a wooden table. 'Get _down_!'

As Shepard readied his Carnifex, he took a good look at Alenko; his face was ashen pale, his breathing laboured. He was shaking from both rage and shock. Hurriedly, he shook the burly Russian roughly. 'Hey, hey, _hey!_ Get a grip of yourself. We're getting out of this, but you need to pull together.'

Alenko, who previously would have shaken off Shepard's gesture and rewarded him with a cold stare, now only nodded weakly. Shepard patted his shoulder, before turning to the Doctor. 'Alright, if you've got a game plan, I'd like to hear it.'

The Doctor retrieved his pen-like tool. 'The Silence are draining electricity from the power lines. If I could reach that power box there, I could rewire it.' He pointed towards a power box on an adjacent wall. It was about fifteen feet of open space away, with no usable cover along the way. 'It will take about ten seconds for the backup generators to kick in. The lights will go out. Ten seconds without eye contact on the Silence. You know what this means. You know what they can do, don't you?'

Shepard nodded. 'I've got it covered. Do it.' He drew his Carnifex.

The Doctor began his sprint towards the power box just as the masses of creatures renewed their unearthly roar and focused their attention on him. Shepard moved to a crouching position. His pistol moved neatly to shoulder height just as his free hand gripped the stock for support. As his mind drew focus, he murmured dryly. 'Ladies, welcome to N7.'

His first shot entered the forehead of a hostile creature that had just begun climbing over the railing. The high-caliber round entered neatly into the front of its skull—and exploded out of the back of its head with the force of a grenade. Lightning arced and spun around the room as the creatures kept up their assault. Shepard could feel the wooden table heating up like the wall of an engine room; white hot cracks were beginning to spread along the patina. It wouldn't take much more punishment. He kept his shots accurate—aiming for kill shots to decapitate the creatures. He was all too aware that his heat sink was too shallow to allow for wasteful fire.

Fifteen feet away, the Doctor skidded to a halt next to the power box, slamming into the wall in his haste. Wincing, he pried open the cover and pointed his glowing tool at the interior of the box. Though the electronics were unfamiliar, he was confident that it would take a few seconds at most to hack the system.

Nothing happened. As he ripped back the second layer of casing, he saw the reason. The wires had been haphazardly connected, and stuffed between the components, standing in for insulators that had rotted away, were chunks of straw and shaved wood.

'Wood.' The Doctor sighed as he ducked to avoid a bolt. 'It just had to be wood.'

Next to Shepard, Alenko had come to himself. The cloud of frustration and rage had begun to clear, replaced by a cool determination. From his jacket, he retrieved a speed-loader, and popped open the chamber of his revolver. He snapped a fresh batch of six bullets into the chamber and slapped it into place. Raising his head, he joined Shepard in keeping up a withering fire on the creatures.

'Alright, American. We fight together, for now.' Alenko murmured audibly.

Alenko's accuracy rivaled Shepard's. Despite his revolver being smaller than Shepard's pistol and two hundred years more primitive, nearly every shot he fired was a fatal one. His face bore a look Shepard knew too well—a man on a path for vengeance.

Shepard had killed eight Silence already. He counted twenty when their firefight had just begun. As he made another quick count, his heart sank. The count had actually gone up. They were replenishing the ranks. He initially thought that they were staying in the open, in the humans' line of fire, simply due to hubris or underestimation. Now he suspected that they simply didn't care—their numbers were limitless.

From the eyes of the bound captive sitting calmly a few feet away, Harbinger surveyed the scene with careless detachment. It was amusing to observe the organics struggle against the onset of defeat—to fight against overwhelming will and unstoppable destiny, armed only with little metal weapons and shooting irons. For countless cycles, he had watched race after race fight imminent doom. Draw weapons, muster ships, convene councils, all in the hopes of being the one race that overcomes the odds. All of it in vain. The directive would always remain.

Within Harbinger, in the multitude of contiguous programs, there resided a small bit of code; a remnant of the neural imprint of races long since harvested—a primitive understanding of irony. In organic terms, such a code could probably be the closest possible manifestation of _humour._ It latched on to Harbinger like a commensal, occasionally sparking the launching of another code, that of _pleasure. _

And now, as it watched Shepard pop up time and again to fire shots at an every burgeoning mass of its conscripts, both codes ran through its processing system. Harbinger was actually _amused_.

And, like any sentient being, it decided to increase its amusement by making things more interesting.

The feelers of code and programming retracted from the limp body of the comatose prisoner in his chair. Harbinger shook off the stifling restraints of organic flesh from its consciousness.

-_Releasing control.-_

The limp body slid off the chair and hit the floor. Instantly, the man awoke with a shuddering gasp. Wild, unfocused eyes darted about in their sockets as he pulled himself to a sitting position. Just then, a bolt of blue lightning struck the floor right at his feet, throwing up fragments of tiling and concrete upon impact, the shockwave lifting him a clear two feet off the ground and tossing him across the floor. Several more bolts began to rain down around him.

Harbinger smoothly transferred his control to that of one of the nearby Silence. As the wounded man rose to his feet in sheer confusion, Harbinger's amusement increased. _Let us now see what becomes of a puppet whose strings are cut._

He was walking, running, crawling, all at the same time. Blue light flashed around him, his skin was on fire from pain. _Where am I? _He fell to his knees, still crawling, searching for a place to hide, to recover. _Lightning. Pain. _

He saw a dark shadow ahead, a hollow where the lightning did not seem to penetrate. Rolling sideways, he pushed himself into this dark shape. He massaged his temple. His brain was trying to kick itself back into gear. As his vision cleared, he realised that the dark shape was the back of a two-meter tall computer processor.

He pressed his back against it and hoped for the best.

Shepard reloaded his Carnifex. It was his second, and last clip. He took a moment to activate his Omnitool. It had to work. If it didn't, it would all be over and they would all die without even the solace of the memory of the reason for their deaths. He calibrated it quickly.

The Silence were massing on the catwalk above. With a sinking heart, he saw three or four climb deftly over the railing, dropping to the floor below like lanky spiders, their gait unhurried.

The Doctor's shout rose over the din. 'It's ready!' He remained poised over the box, his SONIC screwdriver hovering above the final component to be activated.

'Do it!' Shepard shouted back.

The Doctor activated his tool.

And instantly all was dark.

* * *

**CURRENT TIME**

**FOURTEEN MINUTES LATER**

POST-**SILENCE AMNESIAC CLASS ONE ANOMALY (SACOA)**

As guns were pointed at each other and the gathered individuals exchanged glares and silent threats, the alert sound of a program beeped from Shepard's gauntlet.

Immediately, a holograph burst forth from his gauntlet into the midst of the gathering of confused people. From within the unfocused, pulsating light of the projector, the image of a Silent stood tall in the middle of the room, staring straight ahead.

Without speaking a word, every person in the room fixed his eyes on the still image.

'What…' Shepard began to speak.

Then he heard his own voice broadcast back to him from the Omnitool. Low-pitched, almost breathless, he heard himself speaking words he could not recall saying.

'This is a reminder to everyone viewing this holograph. I recorded this to help you recall. If your mind has been wiped, look at this image. You will now remember everything that has transpired since your encounter with this creature. Look hard. Focus. Remember.'

Then the broadcast ceased and the holograph flickered out of focus.

Instantly, the rush of memories broke through the barrier of amnesia, almost bringing Shepard to his knees. He remembered everything. All that had taken place. As he glanced around, he realised that everyone else was experiencing a similar effect. Alenko released his grip on the gun, allowing the firearm to fall. Glancing around like a man waking from a dream, he rubbed his hands as if to punctuate his restored control over his limbs. Even Mirage and his team were stumbling about as if emerging from a deep stupor. He realised now just how many were affected by the Silence.

Shepard glanced at the walkway where the ranks of Silence stood. The catwalks were empty. They had vanished, taking their dead with them. They effectively left no trace of their presence—no triggering factor to spark the recollection of memory.

Mirage dropped his gun, gripping his temple with both of his hands. He turned to Shepard and spoke slowly, like a man confessing a long-hidden secret. 'I—I can remember now. Its face, its face staring straight at me.' He rubbed his forehead, turning his face towards Lupus. 'The day of our commission. You remember too.'

Lupus' face was deathly pale. 'Its voice. I remember its voice. I remember looking around the interrogation room, wondering why no one was reacting, why our supervisors were just standing there doing nothing as that—thing—stared at us.' He took a long, deep breath. 'Then it spoke.'

Next to him, their teammate Digger broke his silence. 'It told us to obey it. To listen to every word it said, to not question, to not hesitate. It said it wanted to show us an example.'

Digger's bearded chin trembled. 'There was a girl there, about six years old. She was just sitting there. It handed me a shaving razor. Then it told me to stand up. I did. It told me to take the razor. I did. Then it told me to—' His voice caught in his throat. Shepard gazed at Digger's face. For a moment, he realised that it may have been more merciful to allow him to continue to forget.

Hamfist, the hulking operative standing next to him, was the next to recount his memories. 'It told us that we would have radio earpieces, all tuned in only to its voice. We would listen, and we would obey. It told us that it would have a name, a name that we would hear and recognise, and obey. It called itself—oh no. Son of a—'

Mirage completed Hamfist's sentence. 'It called itself—Headman.'

Without a word, his hand shot to his ear, and he violently ripped the earpiece coiled around his auricle. His teammates did the same. The magnitude of the deception was too much to bear.

Alenko spoke. 'It's clear now. These creatures have been playing everyone from both sides of the table—the Soviets, and the Allies. Their objective had been to ensure that Sputnik was launched.'

'And then they sent the Americans on a cleanup mission, to kill me. They knew I would show up somehow.' The Doctor said. 'They were prepared. Oh, they are good!' He threw his arms in the air, earning the stern stares of all who were gathered. Unfazed, he continued to speak. 'It's obvious now. They had indoctrinated individuals planted all over Soviet Russia and the United States for years, decades maybe. You, you special operatives—'he pointed at Mirage. 'They must have trained you specifically. A black mission, so to speak. Probably even a suicide mission. You were sent here to stop me. Ensure the satellite was launched, and finish me off for good. Kill two birds with one stone. And you!'

He now pointed at the confused man standing apart from the crowd. 'You were sent to kill Bondarenko.'

The man nodded weakly. The room went silent as they stared at him; Alenko's glare was filled with pure venom.

'I remember now.' He began to speak. 'My mission was to kill Bondarenko. I received orders only via radio. Now I remember everything.' He breathed deeply. 'My name is Victor Ross. I was a mercenary operating in Lesotho in 1955. Then the CIA found me and gave me a blank check in exchange for my skills. I did what I was paid to do. They assigned me a handler, told me that I would correspond only with him, that he would assign targets and I would eliminate them.' He paused. 'Only now do I recall that I never could remember what he looked like, or what he told me to do specifically.'

The man gazed down at his jacket, decked with equipment. He looked at his hands, wondering how many lives he had taken, how many unspeakable deeds remained hidden in the silence of his memory. 'They used me. Look, I was a hired gun. A killer for sale. But I chose which guys to shoot at. Local warlords, opium bosses, deranged rogue generals. People that deserved to die.' He looked straight at Alenko. 'Your general was a bastard.' Alenko's brow narrowed in cold fury; but the man continued. 'But he was a bastard with principles. I read the field reports and dossiers on how he managed to keep many of the Stalingrad veterans out of the gulag, recruiting them instead to work at Baikonur. Back in his hometown, he was channeling money to bribe officials to protect people in his community from the purges. True, he was my enemy. But he didn't deserve to die. Not like this.'

'And then—' Ross breathed. 'They got inside me. They locked me in a room. I pounded on the door for hours. There was blue light everywhere. And there was a voice. It was everywhere around the room. It kept speaking, over and over, _obey. _I told them to stop. I shouted and screamed for them to stop. And then, finally, one of the scientists told me there was nothing to stop. The room had been quiet for the whole few hours. The voice was coming from inside my head.'

Ross clenched his fist. 'I'm done being a pawn. I'm taking down these aliens if I'm doing it with my bare hands.'

Alenko stared at Ross, breathing heavily. Then he took a firm step towards the man. Ross' five-foot-nine stature was almost swallowed up by Alenko's figure. Shepard moved forward instinctively to stop hostilities. Alenko's hand was raised in the air. But then, unexpectedly, it came to rest on Ross' shoulder. Ross looked up, surprised.

'We are enemies. But now we see who the real foes are. Creatures who manipulate kin to kill kin, who take delight in the death and destruction of humanity. Monsters who hide on the edges of memory, slinking in shadows. Creatures that must be stopped.' He waved a hand at Mirage and his team. 'We remain enemies, even now. But a greater evil threatens us. It discriminates not between East and West, capitalist or proletariat. It seeks only to enslave men. If it succeeds, this will no longer be a world of men, but of demons.' He pointed across the room. Every eye followed his finger to the monolith towering over the assembled men. 'They claim to have written our future. Claim to have written our doom in solid stone. But today, with our hearts and minds, we say to them: it will not be so.'

Raising his revolver, he pointed straight at the peak of the monolith. With a single shot, the carving of the Reaper shattered under the force of the high caliber bullet. A long, sharp crack split down half the length of the monolith, cutting across the expanse of words foretelling humanity's doom. Defiance had been sent. Humanity had given its message.

'I'm willing to fight. Who stands alongside me?'

Ross stepped forward. 'I'm in.' He picked up his handgun from the floor, and readied his ballistic knife. 'I've got a score to settle.'

Mirage raised his hand. 'I've got guns. I know how to use them.'

The rest of his team echoed their assent.

Shepard put his hand on Alenko's shoulder. 'I once had a friend who shared your name. He was a good man, a worthy and honourable human being. I stood by him then. I stand by you now.'

He extended a palm. Alenko gripped it, and they shook hands.

Their camaraderie was shattered by an alert broadcast over the facility-wide PA system.

_Final launch protocols initiated. Time until liftoff: fifteen minutes._

Alenko turned to the Doctor, with a grim smile. 'You have a plan?'

* * *

**Hope you enjoyed this chapter! My apologies for the extremely long delay; two months is really not a good record to set. I had been working on this for some time; as I wrote, the story evolved, and the plot continued to expand. My aim was to keep the story coherent while exploring new territory beyond either Dr. Who or Mass Effect. Let me know if you think I succeeded, or bit off more than I could chew.  
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**To everyone who commented, reviewed and sent messages, thank you so much! I hope to continue to provide for your reading pleasure. If you've any critiques, comments, suggestions or corrections (out of character, plot inconsistencies, and the good old occasional grammar mistake) don't hesitate to let me know. The Doctor and his companions will stay in Soviet Russia for one more chapter. It remains to be seen if they make it out.**


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